A statistical intercomparison of temperature and precipitation predicted by four general circulation models with historical data

Conference · Tue Aug 01 04:00:00 EDT 1989

OSTI ID:5604263

Grotch, S L ^[1]

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1. Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (USA)

This study is a detailed intercomparison of the results produced by four different General Circulation Models (GCMs) that have been used to estimate the climatic consequences of a doubling of CO{sub 2} concentration. Two variables, surface air temperature and precipitation, annually and seasonally averaged, are compared for both the current climate and for the predicted equilibrium changes after a doubling of the atmospheric CO{sub 2} concentration. The major question considered here is. How well the predictions from different GCMs agree with each other and with historical climatology over different aeral extents, from the global scale down to the range of only several gridpoints. Although the models often agree well when estimating averages over large areas, substantial disagreements become apparent as the spatial scale is reduced. At scales below continental, the correlations observed between different model predictions are often very poor. The implications of this work for investigation of climatic impacts on a regional scale are profound. For these two important variables, at least, the poor agreement between model simulations of the current climate on the regional scale calls into question the ability of these models to quantitatively estimate future climatic change on anything approaching the scale of a few (<10) gridpoints, which is essential if these results are to be used in meaningful resource assessment studies. 13 refs., 13 figs.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (USA)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE/ER
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-48
• OSTI ID: 5604263
• Report Number(s): UCRL-101726; CONF-8905106--1; ON: DE89017785
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

500200* -- Environment
Atmospheric-- Chemicals Monitoring &amp; Transport-- (-1989)
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
AMBIENT TEMPERATURE
ATMOSPHERIC PRECIPITATIONS
CARBON COMPOUNDS
CARBON DIOXIDE
CARBON OXIDES
CHALCOGENIDES
CLIMATES
COMPARATIVE EVALUATIONS
CONCENTRATION RATIO
DISTRIBUTION
FORECASTING
GENERAL CIRCULATION MODELS
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
MODIFICATIONS
OXIDES
OXYGEN COMPOUNDS
REGIONAL ANALYSIS
SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION