Earth System Science Partnership for Global Change Research

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Earth System Science Partnershipfor Global
Change Research

• an integrated study of the Earth System,
• the changes occurring to the System, and
• the implications for global sustainability.

Integrated Regional Studies
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World Climate Research Programme (WCRP)

• Established 1980
• Sponsors WMO (1980), ICSU (1980) and IOC
  (1993)

• Objectives
• To determine the predictability of climate
• To determine the effect of human activities on
  climate

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Achievements after 25 years of WCRP

• Significantly improved observing systems
  (atmosphere, ocean, land, cryosphere)
• Sophisticated coupled climate models
• Advanced assimilation techniques and forecast
  techniques / systems including ones based on
  ensembles of models
• L-T predictions possible, e.g. El Nino
• Another level of knowledge about climate
  predictability and change
• etc.

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Challenges for WCRP

• Seamless prediction problem
• - medium range, weeks, decades, centuries
• Prediction of the broader climate/Earth system
• Demonstrate the usefulness to society of
  WCRP-enabled predictions projections
• Coordinate implement activities to exploit
  fully
• - new increasing data streams (environmental
  satellites in situ observations i.e. the
  Argo system)
• - growth in capability availability of
  computing
• - increasing complexity breadth of models
• - increasing data assimilation ability

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WGNE WGCMWGSFIPABWGSAT
CLIVAR 1995 ?
ACSYS/CliC 19942003/2000 ?
CliC 2000 ?
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• WCRP Domains
• Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment
• Climate and Cryosphere
• Climate Variability and Predictability
• Stratospheric Processes and their Role in Climate

GEWEX CliC CLIVAR SPARC
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COPES Coordinated Observation Prediction of
the Earth System

• AIM
• To facilitate prediction of the climate/earth
  system variability and change for use in an
  increasing range of practical applications of
  direct relevance, benefit and value to society

• Goals
• Determine what aspects of the climate/earth
  system are and are not predictable, at weekly,
  seasonal, interannual and decadal through to
  century time-scales
• Utilise improving observing systems, data
  assimilation techniques and models of the
  climate/earth system
• (-gt IGBP, GCOS, NWP centres, )

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Priorities for the next decade (agreed at
WCRP-Conference, Geneva, 1997)

• Assessing the nature and predictability of
  seasonal to interdecadal climate variations at
  global and regional scales
• Providing the scientific basis for operational
  predictions
• Detecting climate change and attributing causes
• Projecting the magnitude and rate of
  human-induced change (as input for IPCC, UNFCCC,
  ...)

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2005 after 25 years of WCRP
New overarching and integrating Strategic
Framework Prediction of entire climate
system (? Earth System) FGGE ? extended
weather prediction TOGA ? seasonal
prediction (tropics)THORPEX ? deterministic 2nd
week prediction esp high impact weather, GWE
COPES ? climate system prediction
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Coordinated Observation and Prediction of the
Earth System COPES(2005-2015)

• Project Contributions
• observing system components
• process understanding
• model components
• interaction with global system
• (impact and response)
• assimilation reanalysis
• prediction scenarios
• contribution to specific themes

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Coordinated Observation and Prediction of the
Earth System(2005-2015)
COPES
TF-4
SPARC
TF-3
GEWEX

CLIVAR
CliC
TF-COPES
TF-2
TF-SP
TF-1
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WGNE WGCMWGSFIPAB
CLIVAR 1995 ?
CliC 2000 ?
TFSP,TF-COPES
Coordinated Observation and Prediction of the
Earth System
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EXAMPLES of specific objectives

• Regional climate change
• Systematic errors in AGCM and CGCM
• Arid and desert climates
• Predictability of monsoons
• Contribution to IPCC WG1 report
• Improving projection of mean sea level rise
• Production of climate data sets
• Chemistry climate models -gt ES models

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WCRP COPES Status

• Task Force formed to define and initiate a
  process to plan implement COPES report to
  JSC26 in 2005
• COPES discussion document available to WCRP
  stakeholders for comments, including suggestions
  for Specific Objectives

• Reports to JSC
• Co-chairs B.Hoskins, J.Church
• Representatives of core projects
• Chairs of modeling and obs. panels
• Experts in op. prediction, satellite obs., and
  funding of large programmes
• Will propose organisation and initial objectives
  of COPES

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Modelling Panel

• Coordinate modelling across WCRP
• Focus on climate system prediction
• Liaise with WGOA (assim., initial., reanalysis,
  data gaps)
• Oversee data management in modelling activities
• Liaise with IGBP and IHDP
• Chair J.Shukla
• GEWEX member J.Polcher

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WG on Observation and Assimilation

• Coordinates synthesis of global obs. through
  analysis, reanalysis, assimilation across WCRP
• Facilitates interaction with WMO, IOC, GCOS,
  GOOS, etc. wrt to optimization of observing
  systems
• Coordinates information and data management
  across WCRP
• Takes over tasks of WG on satellite matters

• Chair K.Trenberth
• Secretariat G.Sommeria
• Members J.Shukla, J.Key, W.Rossow, B.Randel,
  A.Lorenc, A.Simmons, G.Duchossois, M.Manton,
  E.Harrison, CLIVAR ?
• Space agencies? Other experts?

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Proposal for development of global climate
products (for WGOA)

• Systematic re-processing and coordinated
  re-analysis of all available observations
  acquired from various satellite sensors and other
  data sources since several decades
• Would be complementary to model re-analyses in
  order to define present climate
• Would serve as a benchmark to validate climate
  models and thus improve our ability to forecast
  climate evolution at all time scales
• Would contribute to the development of a
  coordinated global observation strategy

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Task Force on Seasonal Prediction

• Determine extent to which seasonal prediction of
  global/regional climate is possible with current
  models and observations
• Identify the current limitations of the climate
  system model and observational data sets used to
  determine seasonal predictability
• Develop a coordinated plan for pan-WCRP climate
  system retrospective seasonal forecasting
  experiments
• Reported to the JSC in March 2004, the next
  report in March 2005

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Hypothesis

• There is currently untapped seasonal
  predictability due to interactions (and memory)
  among all the elements of the climate system
  (Atmosphere-Ocean-Land-Cryosphere)
• Condition Seasonal Predictability Needs to be
  Assessed with Respect to a Changing Climate
• Use IPCC Class Models

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Contributions of WCRP Projects

• GEWEX
• provides guidance on how to initialize land
  surface
• proposes/implements diagnostic studies
  numerical experiments understanding land-surface
  feedbacks
• CliC
• provides guidance on how to initialize cryosphere
• proposes/implements diagnostic studies
  numerical experiments
• CLIVAR
• provides guidance on how to initialize
  ocean-atmosphere
• proposes/implements diagnostic studies
  numerical experiments understanding
  atmosphere-ocean coupling and variability
• SPARC
• provides guidance on how to prescribe atmospheric
  composition
• provides guidance on how to initialize the
  stratosphere
• proposes/implements diagnostic studies
  numerical experiments

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• Arctic Ocean Model Intercomparison Project
  (AOMIP)
• Arctic Regional Climate Model Intercomparison
  Project (ARMIP)
• Asian-Australian Monsoon Atmospheric GCM
  Intercomparison Project
• Atmospheric Model Intercomparison Project (AMIP)
• Atmospheric Tracer Transport Model
  Intercomparison Project (TransCom)
• Carbon-Cycle Model Linkage Project (CCMLP)
• Climate of the Twentieth Century Project (C20C)
• Cloud Model Feedback Intercomparison Project
• Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP)
• Coupled Carbon Cycle Climate Model
  Intercomparison Project (C4MIP)
• Dynamics of North Atlantic Models (DYNAMO)
• Ecosystem Model-Data Intercomparison (EMDI)
• Earth system Models of Intermediate Complexity
  (EMICs)
• ENSO Intercomparison Project (ENSIP)
• GEWEX Atmospheric Boundary Layer Study (GABLS)
• GEWEX Cloud System Study (GCSS)
• GCM-Reality Intercomparison Project for SPARC
  (GRIPS)
• Global Land-Atmosphere Coupling Experiment
  (GLACE)
• Global Soil Wetness Project (GSWP)

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• Proposed ESSP Modelling Strategy
• Experimentation with current GCMs for
• hindcasts and projections (IPCC),
• assimilation and prediction of the coupled system
  on
• seasonal to decadal time-scales
• Improvement and validation of current GCMs used
  in 1
• GCM components of the carbon cycle, dynamic
  vegetation,
• tropospheric chemistry, and a range of
  biogeochemical cycles
• Extending GCMs to include these additional
  components
• of the Earth System in turn, as a basis for 1

WCRP WCRP IGBP WCRP/ IGBP
cryosphere, CliC
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Proposed ESSP Modelling Strategy

• Development of more holistic models (including
  EMICs) to
• study the interactive aspects of the natural
• system
• simulate longer time-scales, e.g. Ice Age Cycle
• compare and validate with GCMs where possible
• Development of models of the interaction between
• the human and natural systems based on the more
  holistic models
• Simple models for design of the diagnosis of
• complex coupled models

IGBP IGBP/ IHDP/ DIVERSITAS ALL
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Time frame for COPES

• COPES will use the 1979-2004-2009 period to
  develop reference climate data sets and advanced
  forecasting techniques. This period will be used
  for retrospective forecasts of weekly?, seasonal,
  inter-annual and decadal variations
• The period 2010-2019 will serve as a testbed for
  real time forecasts
• Need and use of special observing periods?
• Defining and planning of COPES will continue and
  will be widely presented at the 2006 Global
  Change Conference which markes the WCRPs 25th
  anniversary

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Recent and future WCRP Conferences
WOCE Final, San Antonio, 11-15 November
2002 ACSYS Final, St. Petersburg, 11-14 November
2003 CLIVAR 1st Science Conference, Baltimore,
21-25 June 2004 3rd SPARC General Assembly,
Victoria, 1-6 August 2004 1st SOLAS Open Science
Conference, 13-16 October 2004 CliC 1st Science
Conference, Beijing, 11-15 April 2005 5th GEWEX
Science Conference, Irvine, 20-24 June 2005 2nd
Global Change Conference, Beijing, October (?)
2006
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JPS for WCRP
David Carson D/WCRP, ESSP
V. Satyan D/modelling, WGNE, WGCM, START, MP
Gilles Sommeria GEWEX, WGOA
Valery Detemmerman CLIVAR
Vladimir Ryabinin CliC, SPARC, fluxes
Ann Salini Anne Chautard
Margaret Lennon-Smith
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Current Status of Climate Change Prediction
We can produce a small number of different
predictions with no idea of how reliable they
might be
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THE TASK (simplified, after Kevin Trenberth)

• Take a large almost round rotating sphere 8,000
  miles (12,800 km) in diameter.
• Surround it with a murky viscous atmosphere of
  many gases mixed with water vapour, aerosols,
  etc..
• Tilt its axis so that it wobbles back and forth
  with respect to the source of heat and light.
• Freeze it at both ends and roast it in the
  middle.
• Cover most of the surface with a flowing liquid
  that sometimes freezes and which feeds vapour
  into that atmosphere as it shifts up and down to
  the rhythmic pulling of the moon and the sun.
• Condense and freeze some of the water vapour into
  clouds of imaginative shapes, sizes and
  composition.
• Then try to predict the future conditions of that
  system for each place over the globe.

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The Earth System Coupling the Physical,
Biogeochemical and Human Components
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Science
Seasonal to Decadal Forecasting
Regional Anomaly Prediction
Anthropogenic Climate Change, Detection
Attribution
Data Assimilation Techniques
Atmosphere Ocean Coupled
Tools
Operational Prediction Systems
Earth System Models
Coupled phys.-biol.-chem. Models
FGGE
TOGA
CLIVAR
GEWEX
core projects
ACSYS
CliC
SPARC