Challenges and Prospects for Reducing Coupled Climate Model SST Biases in the Eastern Tropical Atlantic and Pacific Oceans: The U.S. CLIVAR Eastern Tropical Oceans Synthesis Working Group

2016/05/19 by Paquita Zuidema, Ping Chang, Brian Medeiros +20 · 183 citations
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Environmental Science · #Atmosphere (unit) #Climate change #Climate model #Climate variability and models #Climatology #Eddy #Environmental science #Equator #Geography #Geology #Latitude #Meteorological Phenomena and Simulations #Meteorology #Oceanic basin #Oceanographic and Atmospheric Processes #Oceanography #Predictability #Sea surface temperature #Structural basin #Tropical Atlantic #Upwelling

paper · pdf · doi:10.1175/bams-d-15-00274.1

published in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 97(12), 2305-2328 (American Meteorological Society)

openalex publication_date 2016/05/19 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/27

Abstract

Abstract Well-known problems trouble coupled general circulation models of the eastern Atlantic and Pacific Ocean basins. Model climates are significantly more symmetric about the equator than is observed. Model sea surface temperatures are biased warm south and southeast of the equator, and the atmosphere is too rainy within a band south of the equator. Near-coastal eastern equatorial SSTs are too warm, producing a zonal SST gradient in the Atlantic opposite in sign to that observed. The U.S. Climate Variability and Predictability Program (CLIVAR) Eastern Tropical Ocean Synthesis Working Group (WG) has pursued an updated assessment of coupled model SST biases, focusing on the surface energy balance components, on regional error sources from clouds, deep convection, winds, and ocean eddies; on the sensitivity to model resolution; and on remote impacts. Motivated by the assessment, the WG makes the following recommendations: 1) encourage identification of the specific parameterizations contributing to the biases in individual models, as these can be model dependent; 2) restrict multimodel intercomparisons to specific processes; 3) encourage development of high-resolution coupled models with a concurrent emphasis on parameterization development of finer-scale ocean and atmosphere features, including low clouds; 4) encourage further availability of all surface flux components from buoys, for longer continuous time periods, in persistently cloudy regions; and 5) focus on the eastern basin coastal oceanic upwelling regions, where further opportunities for observational–modeling synergism exist.

Cited by

• The Ongoing Need for High-Resolution Regional Climate Models: Process Understanding and Stakeholder Information
• Simulating Hurricane Katrina in the Simple Cloud‐Resolving E3SM Atmosphere Model v1
• Subtropical clouds key to Southern Ocean teleconnections to the tropical Pacific
• Impact of projected sea surface temperature biases on tropical cyclones projections in the South Pacific. [europepmc]
• The diurnal cycle of the smoky marine boundary layer observed during August in the remote southeast Atlantic. [europepmc]

Related

• Connecting the SST Pattern Problem and the Hot Model Problem
• Diagnosing Biases in Tropical Atlantic-Pacific Multi-Decadal Teleconnections Across CMIP6 and E3SM Models
• Isolating the contribution of local and non-local shortwave flux biases towards climatological sea surface temperature biases within a coupled climate model
• The Seasonal Cycle over the Tropical Pacific in Coupled Ocean–Atmosphere General Circulation Models
• Km-scale coupled simulation and model–observation SST trend discrepancy