Regional climate model projections for the State of Washington

Salathé, Eric P.; Leung, L. Ruby; Qian, Yun; Zhang, Yongxin

doi:10.1007/s10584-010-9849-y

Cited by 122 publications

(116 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Warming on the order of 1-2.5°C and 1.5-3.5°C is noted over the western U.S. in respectively (Figs. 13a,b), in consistence with the regional warming identified in Leung et al (2004), Salathé et al (2008), and Salathé et al (2009). In ECHAM5-WRF, warming is about 0.5-1°C larger over the Southwest U.S. than the PNW (Fig.…”

Section: Future Changessupporting

confidence: 52%

ENSO anomalies over the Western United States: present and future patterns in regional climate simulations

et al. 2011

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Surface temperature, precipitation, specific humidity and wind anomalies associated with the warm and cold phases of ENSO simulated by WRF and HadRM are examined for the present and future decades. WRF is driven by ECHAM5 and CCSM3, respectively, and HadRM is driven by HadCM3. For the current decades, the ECHAM5-WRF, CCSM3-WRF and HadRM simulations are broadly consistent with the observed warm-dry and cool-wet teleconnection patterns over the Pacific Northwest (PNW) and the Southwest U.S. for warm and cold ENSO. Differences in the regional simulations originate primarily from the respective driving fields. For the future decades, the warm-dry and cold-wet teleconnection patterns in association with ENSO are still represented in ECHAM5-WRF and HadRM. However, there are indications of changes in the ENSO teleconnection patterns in CCSM3-WRF in the future, with wet anomalies dominating in the PNW and the Southwest U.S. for both warm and cold ENSO, in contrast to the canonical patterns of precipitation anomalies. Interaction of anomalous wind flow with local terrain plays a critical role in the generation of anomalous precipitation over the western U.S. Anomalous dry conditions are always associated with anomalous airflow that runs in parallel to local mountains and wet conditions with airflow that runs in perpendicular to local mountains. Future changes in temperature, precipitation and wind associated with the ENSO events in the ECHAM5-WRF and HadRM simulations appear to suggest weakening of teleconnection patterns for warm ENSO but strengthening of teleconnection patterns for cold ENSO.

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Section: Future Changessupporting

confidence: 52%

ENSO anomalies over the Western United States: present and future patterns in regional climate simulations

et al. 2011

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“…The model was applied with 31 vertical levels and a vertical resolution of ∼ 40-100 m throughout the boundary layer with the model top fixed at 50 mb. Details of the model setup and a discussion of the results are reported by Salathé et al (2010), Zhang et al (2009Zhang et al ( , 2012 and Duliére (2011Duliére ( , 2013.…”

Section: Climate and Meteorologymentioning

confidence: 99%

The effects of global change upon United States air quality

et al. 2015

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Abstract.To understand more fully the effects of global changes on ambient concentrations of ozone and particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter smaller than 2.5 µm (PM 2.5 ) in the United States (US), we conducted a comprehensive modeling effort to evaluate explicitly the effects of changes in climate, biogenic emissions, land use and global/regional anthropogenic emissions on ozone and PM 2.5 concentrations and composition. Results from the ECHAM5 global climate model driven with the A1B emission scenario from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were downscaled using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model to provide regional meteorological fields. We developed air quality simulations using the Community Multiscale Air Quality Model (CMAQ) chemical transport model for two nested domains with 220 and 36 km horizontal grid cell resolution for a semi-hemispheric domain and a continental United States (US) domain, respectively. The semihemispheric domain was used to evaluate the impact of projected global emissions changes on US air quality. WRF meteorological fields were used to calculate current (2000s) and future (2050s) biogenic emissions using the Model of Emissions of Gases and Aerosols from Nature (MEGAN). For the semi-hemispheric domain CMAQ simulations, presentday global emissions inventories were used and projected to the 2050s based on the IPCC A1B scenario. Regional anthropogenic emissions were obtained from the US Environmental Protection Agency National Emission Inventory 2002 (EPA NEI2002) and projected to the future using the MARKet ALlocation (MARKAL) energy system model assuming a business as usual scenario that extends current decade emission regulations through 2050. Our results suggest that daily maximum 8 h average ozone (DM8O) concentrations will increase in a range between 2 to 12 parts per billion (ppb) across most of the continental US. The highest increase occurs in the South, Central and Midwest regions of the US due to increases in temperature, enhanced biogenic emissions and changes in land use. The model predicts an average increase of 1-6 ppb in DM8O due to projected increase in global emissions of ozone precursors. The effects of these factors are only partially offset by reductions in DM8O associated with decreasing US anthropogenic emissions. Increases in PM 2.5 levels between 4 and 10 µg m −3 in the Northeast, Southeast, Midwest and South regions are mostly a result of increase in primary anthropogenic particulate matter (PM), enhanced biogenic emissions and land use changes. Changes in boundary conditions shift the composition but do not alter overall simulated PM 2.5 mass concentrations.

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“…It is increasingly in use throughout the world as a regional climate model (RCM) for dynamical downscaling of global models for two separate purposes. The first of these is its use with different global climate models (GCMs) in an attempt to determine long-term trends in the climate of a given region (e.g., Caldwell et al 2009;Zhang et al 2009;Salathé et al 2010). An alternative and sometimes complementary application of WRF is to increase the resolution beyond that available from the GCM (or reanalysis data) for a particular geographic region and often with a particular state variable or local phenomenon in mind (e.g., Borge et al 2008;Flaounas et al 2010;Evans and McCabe 2010;Mercader et al 2010;Prabha et al 2011).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…An alternative and sometimes complementary application of WRF is to increase the resolution beyond that available from the GCM (or reanalysis data) for a particular geographic region and often with a particular state variable or local phenomenon in mind (e.g., Borge et al 2008;Flaounas et al 2010;Evans and McCabe 2010;Mercader et al 2010;Prabha et al 2011). Salathé et al (2010) compared two 100-yr regional climate simulations for the State of Washington using WRF. One simulation was forced by the NCAR Community Climate System Model version 3 (CCSM3) and the second was driven by the Max Plank Institute Hamburg ECHAM5 global model.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluation of the Sensitivity of the Weather Research and Forecasting Model to Parameterization Schemes for Regional Climates of Europe over the Period 1990–95

2013

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The Weather Research and Forecasting model (WRF) is used to downscale interim ECMWF Re-Analysis (ERA-Interim) data for the climate over Europe for the period 1990-95 with grid spacing of 0.448 for 12 combinations of physical parameterizations. Two longwave radiation schemes, two land surface models (LSMs), two microphysics schemes, and two planetary boundary layer (PBL) schemes have been investigated while the remaining physics schemes were unchanged. WRF simulations are compared with Ensemble-Based Predictions of Climate Changes and their Impacts (ENSEMBLES) observations gridded dataset (E-OBS) for surface air temperatures (T2), precipitation, and mean sea level pressure (MSLP) in eight subregions within the model domain to assess the performance of the different parameterizations on widely varying regional climates. This work shows that T2 is modeled well by WRF with high correlation coefficients (0.8 , R , 0.95) and biases less than 48C. T2 shows greatest sensitivity to land surface models, some sensitivity to longwave radiation schemes, and less sensitivity to microphysics and PBL schemes. Precipitation is not well modeled by WRF with low correlation coefficients (0.1 , R , 0.3) and high root-mean-square differences (RMSDs; 8-9 mm day 21 ). Precipitation shows sensitivity to LSMs in summer. No significant bias has been observed in the MSLP modeled by WRF. Correlation coefficients are typically in the range 0.7 , R , 0.8 while RMSDs are in the range 6-10 hPa. MSLP output is sensitive to longwave radiation scheme in summer but is relatively insensitive to either microphysics or the choice of LSM. The optimum combination of parameterizations for all three state variables examined is strongly dependent on subregion and demonstrates the need to carefully select parameterization combinations when attempting to use WRF as a regional climate model.

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Regional climate model projections for the State of Washington

Cited by 122 publications

References 32 publications

ENSO anomalies over the Western United States: present and future patterns in regional climate simulations

ENSO anomalies over the Western United States: present and future patterns in regional climate simulations

The effects of global change upon United States air quality

Evaluation of the Sensitivity of the Weather Research and Forecasting Model to Parameterization Schemes for Regional Climates of Europe over the Period 1990–95

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