Precipitation Simulations Using WRF as a Nested Regional Climate Model

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    Author
    Bukovsky, MS; Karoly, DJ
    Date
    2009-10-01
    Source Title
    Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology
    Publisher
    AMER METEOROLOGICAL SOC
    University of Melbourne Author/s
    Karoly, David
    Affiliation
    Science - Earth Sciences
    Metadata
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    Document Type
    Journal Article
    Citations
    Bukovsky, M. S. & Karoly, D. J. (2009). Precipitation Simulations Using WRF as a Nested Regional Climate Model. JOURNAL OF APPLIED METEOROLOGY AND CLIMATOLOGY, 48 (10), pp.2152-2159. https://doi.org/10.1175/2009JAMC2186.1.
    Access Status
    Open Access
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/11343/32786
    DOI
    10.1175/2009JAMC2186.1
    ARC Grant code
    ARC/FF0668679
    Description

    © Copyright 2009 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be “fair use” under Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act (17 USC §108, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the AMS’s permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form, such as on a web site or in a searchable database, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statement, requires written permission or a license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policy, available on the AMS Web site located at (http://www.ametsoc.org/) or from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or copyrights@ametsoc.org.
    Abstract
    Abstract This note examines the sensitivity of simulated U.S. warm-season precipitation in the Weather Research and Forecasting model (WRF), used as a nested regional climate model, to variations in model setup. Numerous options have been tested and a few of the more interesting and unexpected sensitivities are documented here. Specifically, the impacts of changes in convective and land surface parameterizations, nest feedbacks, sea surface temperature, and WRF version on mean precipitation are evaluated in 4-month-long simulations. Running the model over an entire season has brought to light some issues that are not otherwise apparent in shorter, weather forecast–type simulations, emphasizing the need for careful scrutiny of output from any model simulation. After substantial testing, a reasonable model setup was found that produced a definite improvement in the climatological characteristics of precipitation over that from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction–National Center for Atmospheric Research global reanalysis, the dataset used for WRF initial and boundary conditions in this analysis.
    Keywords
    precipitation; climate model; regional models; North America; parameterization; model evaluation; model performance

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