Climate simulations with NCAR CCM2 forced by global sea surface temperature, 1950-89
- Los Alamos National Lab., NM (United States)
A 40-yr integration is conducted using the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Community Climate Model Version 2 (CCM2). The simulation was forced by observed monthly global sea surface temperature (SST) changes during 1950-89. The January climates of the model results are presented in the paper. The modeled means and interannual variability are analyzed and compared with observations based on different accounts. First, the authors concentrate on the period of 1951-79. The monthly varying SSTs of this period were used to construct the SST climatology for an earlier 20-yr simulation conducted by NCAR researchers. The difference of the model climatology between the two simulations, respectively, forced by monthly varying SST and annually repeating SST, is examined. The authors then concentrate on the remaining part of the simulation-the period from 1979 to 1989. The global climate during this period analyzed by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) has been widely used for validation purposes by various general circulation model (GCM) studies including the CCM2 simulation mentioned above. The model results of the entire simulation are finally compared with the multidecadal data of sea level pressure and 700-mb geopotential height analyzed by the National Meteorological Center. The decadal analysis of the model results reveals that the model has different performance for different decades. It is found that the simulated circulations are in better agreement with the observations during warmer decades in terms of the evolution of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation. The analysis of tropical/extratropical teleconnection patterns based on the SST index over the central equatorial Pacific and the Northern Hemisphere 700-mb height shows that the negative correlation between these two fields over the northern Pacific takes place somewhat too far west compared with observations. 38 refs.
- OSTI ID:
- 447209
- Journal Information:
- Journal of Climate, Vol. 9, Issue 12; Other Information: PBD: Dec 1996
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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