Köppen bioclimatic evaluation of CMIP historical climate simulations

Phillips, Thomas J.; Bonfils, Céline J. W.

doi:10.1088/1748-9326/10/6/064005

Title: Köppen bioclimatic evaluation of CMIP historical climate simulations

Journal Article · Fri Jun 05 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · Environmental Research Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/10/6/064005· OSTI ID:1222423

Phillips, Thomas J.; Bonfils, Céline J. W.

Köppen bioclimatic classification relates generic vegetation types to characteristics of the interactive annual-cycles of continental temperature (T) and precipitation (P). In addition to predicting possible bioclimatic consequences of past or prospective climate change, a Köppen scheme can be used to pinpoint biases in model simulations of historical T and P. In this study a Köppen evaluation of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP) simulations of historical climate is conducted for the period 1980–1999. Evaluation of an example CMIP5 model illustrates how errors in simulating Köppen vegetation types (relative to those derived from observational reference data) can be deconstructed and related to model-specific temperature and precipitation biases. Measures of CMIP model skill in simulating the reference Köppen vegetation types are also developed, allowing the bioclimatic performance of a CMIP5 simulation of T and P to be compared quantitatively with its CMIP3 antecedent. Although certain bioclimatic discrepancies persist across model generations, the CMIP5 models collectively display an improved rendering of historical T and P relative to their CMIP3 counterparts. Additionally, the Köppen-based performance metrics are found to be quite insensitive to alternative choices of observational reference data or to differences in model horizontal resolution.

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Research Organization:: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER)

Grant/Contract Number:: KP170301; AC52-07NA27344

OSTI ID:: 1222423

Alternate ID(s):: OSTI ID: 1239012; OSTI ID: 1251065

Report Number(s):: LLNL-JRNL-667855

Journal Information:: Environmental Research Letters, Journal Name: Environmental Research Letters Vol. 10 Journal Issue: 6; ISSN 1748-9326

Publisher:: IOP PublishingCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United Kingdom

Language:: English

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Cited by: 21 works

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