Tag: omrani

Mitigating climate biases in the mid-latitude North Atlantic by increasing model resolution: SST gradients and their relation to blocking and the jet

Athanasiadis, P.J., Ogawa, F., Omrani, N.-E., Keenlyside, N., Schiemann, R., Baker, A.J., Vidale, P.L., Bellucci, A., Ruggieri, P., Haarsma, R., Roberts, M., Roberts, C., Novak, L., Gualdi, S. 2022: Mitigating climate biases in the mid-latitude North Atlantic by increasing model resolution: SST gradients and their relation to blocking and the jet. J Clim. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-022-01523-x

Summary: Starting to resolve the oceanic mesoscale in climate models is a step change in model fidelity. This study examines how certain obstinate biases in the midlatitude North Atlantic respond to increasing resolution (from 1° to 0.25° in the ocean) and how such biases in sea surface temperature (SST) affect the atmosphere. Using a multi-model ensemble of historical climate simulations run at different horizontal resolutions, it is shown that a severe cold SST bias in the central North Atlantic, common to many ocean models, is significantly reduced with increasing resolution. The associated bias in the time-mean meridional SST gradient is shown to relate to a positive bias in low-level baroclinicity, while the cold SST bias causes biases also in static stability and diabatic heating in the interior of the atmosphere. The changes in baroclinicity and diabatic heating brought by increasing resolution lead to improvements in European blocking and eddy-driven jet variability. Across the multi-model ensemble a clear relationship is found between the climatological meridional SST gradients in the broader Gulf Stream Extension area and two aspects of the atmospheric circulation: the frequency of high-latitude blocking and the southern-jet regime. This relationship is thought to reflect the two-way interaction (with a positive feedback) between the respective oceanic and atmospheric anomalies. These North Atlantic SST anomalies are shown to be important in forcing significant responses in the midlatitude atmospheric circulation, including jet variability and the stormtrack. Further increases in oceanic and atmospheric resolution are expected to lead to additional improvements in the representation of Euro-Atlantic climate.

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Coupled stratosphere-troposphere-Atlantic multidecadal oscillation and its importance for near-future climate projection

Omrani, NE., Keenlyside, N., Matthes, K., Boljka, L., Zanchettin, D., Jungclaus, JH., Lubis, SW. 2022: Coupled stratosphere-troposphere-Atlantic multidecadal oscillation and its importance for near-future climate projection. npj Clim Atmos Sci. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41612-022-00275-1

Summary: Northern Hemisphere (NH) climate has experienced various coherent wintertime multidecadal climate trends in stratosphere, troposphere, ocean, and cryosphere. However, the overall mechanistic framework linking these trends is not well established. Here we show, using long-term transient forced coupled climate simulation, that large parts of the coherent NH-multidecadal changes can be understood within a damped coupled stratosphere/troposphere/ocean-oscillation framework. Wave-induced downward propagating positive stratosphere/troposphere-coupled Northern Annular Mode (NAM) and associated stratospheric cooling initiate delayed thermohaline strengthening of Atlantic overturning circulation and extratropical Atlantic-gyres. These increase the poleward oceanic heat transport leading to Arctic sea-ice melting, Arctic warming amplification, and large-scale Atlantic warming, which in turn initiates wave-induced downward propagating negative NAM and stratospheric warming and therefore reverse the oscillation phase. This coupled variability improves the performance of statistical models, which project further weakening of North Atlantic Oscillation, North Atlantic cooling and hiatus in wintertime North Atlantic-Arctic sea-ice and global surface temperature just like the 1950s–1970s.

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Assessing the influence of sea surface temperature and arctic sea ice cover on the uncertainty in the boreal winter future climate projections

Cheung, HN., Keenlyside, N., Koenigk, T., Yang, S., Tian, T., Xu, Z., Gao, Y., Ogawa, F., Omrani, N.-E., Qiao, S., Zhou, W. 2022: Assessing the influence of sea surface temperature and arctic sea ice cover on the uncertainty in the boreal winter future climate projections. Clim. Dyn. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-022-06136-0

Summary: We investigate the uncertainty (i.e., inter-model spread) in future projections of the boreal winter climate, based on the forced response of ten models from the CMIP5 following the RCP8.5 scenario. The uncertainty in the forced response of sea level pressure (SLP) is large in the North Pacific, the North Atlantic, and the Arctic. A major part of these uncertainties (31%) is marked by a pattern with a center in the northeastern Pacific and a dipole over the northeastern Atlantic that we label as the Pacific–Atlantic SLP uncertainty pattern (PA∆SLP). The PA∆SLP is associated with distinct global sea surface temperature (SST) and Arctic sea ice cover (SIC) perturbation patterns. To better understand the nature of the PA∆SLP, these SST and SIC perturbation patterns are prescribed in experiments with two atmospheric models (AGCMs): CAM4 and IFS. The AGCM responses suggest that the SST uncertainty contributes to the North Pacific SLP uncertainty in CMIP5 models, through tropical–midlatitude interactions and a forced Rossby wavetrain. The North Atlantic SLP uncertainty in CMIP5 models is better explained by the combined effect of SST and SIC uncertainties, partly related to a Rossby wavetrain from the Pacific and air-sea interaction over the North Atlantic. Major discrepancies between the CMIP5 and AGCM forced responses over northern high-latitudes and continental regions are indicative of uncertainties arising from the AGCMs. We analyze the possible dynamic mechanisms of these responses, and discuss the limitations of this work.

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Understanding the dynamics of recent Norwegian extreme weather events and their influence on energy production

Pecnjak, Martin (2021-08-05). Understanding the dynamics of recent Norwegian extreme weather events and their influence on energy production (Master’s thesis, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway). https://bora.uib.no/bora-xmlui/handle/11250/2778409 .

Summary: The growing frequency and severity of extreme weather events in the Northern Hemisphere has prompted a lot of research being done on their origin and physical mechanisms. Both simplified and complex approaches have been introduced in defining and understanding these events, where they look into high-amplitude quasi-stationary Rossby waves and their quasi-resonant amplification. However, different approaches exist to investigating extreme events and these were just a motivation for this thesis. Since the resonance method is suit- able mostly for summer events and the events discussed in this thesis have happened in all seasons, a different approach was needed. The events in question were a winter drought, two summer and autumn floods, a winter snowfall and a spring/summer heatwave in the areas of south and southwestern Norway. In order to detect certain features which would help solve this issue, we look into anomalies of different meteorological variables such as geopoten- tial height, surface temperature, precipitation and snowfall rate and zonal and meridional winds. Deep and thorough statistical and dynamical analyses are applied to define the out- comes and the physical origins which would help us obtain a clear picture on the whole case. The finite-amplitude local wave activity (LWA) diagnostic, as a measure of the meandering of the jet stream, has helped to give a clear picture along with the large-scale circulation. This method can be used as a proxy for the strength of the eddy-driven jet and the storm track. It has proven to be the key factor in defining what has exactly caused the events in ques- tion. The results and findings have shown that the LWA is a conclusive tool in determining whether an extreme event was related to a blocking pattern or not, while the LWA budget equation components have shed light on the so far poorly understood dynamical aspects which led to the events. The zonal LWA flux has proven to be a good predictor of blocking with its onset in the early stages of the events, similar to the traffic jam concept introduced by (Nakamura and Huang, 2018). The jet stream has a capacity for the LWA flux similar to how a highway has a capacity for the number of vehicles on it. If the capacity is exceeded, blocking occurs, and this is readily shown in the results and findings of this work. As for the budget equation components, the zonal LWA flux convergence has proven to be the key in maintaining the increase of the LWA as well as also having an early onset in each blocking event in agreement with the LWA flux. On the other hand, the residual in the LWA budget, which represents the non-conservative small-scale processes (diabatic sources and sinks of LWA), dampens the LWA. The LWA method has also proven to be useful in all seasons. The motivation for the thesis also came from the influence of the events on the meteorological variables related to the Norwegian energy production. The results show us clues into possible ways of improving forecasting of such events and minimizing their harmful impacts. They also show possibilities in improving energy management, infrastructure, allocation of resources and preparedness of the society for damages and hazards caused by the events. This was not fully investigated in this thesis and is the next step in the research of this topic.

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Evaluating Impacts of Recent Arctic Sea Ice Loss on the Northern Hemisphere Winter Climate Change

Ogawa, F., N. Keenlyside, Y. Gao, T. Koenigk, S. Yang, L. Suo, T. Wang, G. Gastineau, T. Nakamura, N. Cheung Ho, N. E. Omrani, J. Ukita, and V. Semenov, 2018: Evaluating Impacts of Recent Arctic Sea Ice Loss on the Northern Hemisphere Winter Climate Change. Geophysical Research Letters, 45, 3255-3263.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL076502

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