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The U.S. Climate Variability and Predictability Research Program (CLIVAR)

Friday, September 3, 2010


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U.S. CLIVAR produces a monthly electronic news-gram which includes timely information regarding upcoming meetings in addition to announcing climate research opportunities. To subscribe, send an email to with "subscribe" in the subject header and include your contact information.

 

  

  

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PPAI PPAI Meetings/Documents PPAI Science PPAI References/Links

PPAI Meetings and Documents

U.S. CLIVAR Summit - 2008 July 15-17 - Presentations from the panel's breakouts during the summit in Irvine, California

U.S. CLIVAR Summit - 2007 July 23-25 - Presentations from the panel's breakouts during the summit in Annapolis, Maryland

U.S. CLIVAR Summit - 2006 July 26-28 Presentations from the panel's breakouts during the summit in Breckinridge, Colorado

AGU Special Session - December 2006 PPAI Panel Meeting - December 14, 2006

  • Minutes (pdf)
  • DecVar discussion (pdf)

A36:
Increasing Credibility of Climate Predictions
Conveners:
Alex Hall, UCLA, Dept. of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences
Lisa Goddard,
International Research Institute for Climate and Society, Columbia University
The purpose of this session is to examine the credibility of state-of-the-art climate predictions from seasonal to centennial time scales, with an eye toward improving them. On seasonal to interannual time scales, prediction skill can be evaluated statistically by comparing ongoing model predictions to the climate record as it evolves. However, to improve predictions on these time scales, it is necessary to identify and understand the physical mechanisms responsible for predictability and ensure they are properly included in models. On the longer time scales of climate change, it is challenging to evaluate prediction credibility, let alone improve it. The variation of the past century is the only example of forced climate change that has been adequately sampled on a global scale, so rigorous evaluation of model performance is limited to this single realization. Moreover, while current models give widely diverging predictions when identical future forcing scenarios are imposed on them, are all able to simulate a “hindcast” of the past century within observational constraints when realistic past forcing is imposed. Unlike the seasonal to interannual case, the observed climate record is of limited utility in determining which future projections are most realistic. On these time scales, the community is therefore forced to rely almost exclusively on the plausibility of the physical mechanisms underlying simulated climate change. Because of the importance of physical mechanisms in establishing prediction credibility and improving it on all time scales, we solicit papers that identify these mechanisms or evaluate their plausibility. We also solicit work on statistical methods demonstrating prediction reliability on seasonal to interannual time scales, and novel techniques for assessing model credibility on longer time scales.

U.S. CLIVAR Summit - 2005 August 15-18 - The PPAI panel met in Keystone, Colorado to discuss ongoing and future panel activities. Presentations made to the panel are provided below.

 

 

Announcements

2010 Workshop on Evaluation of ReanalysesNovember 1-3, Baltimore, Maryland

First Circular Announcement for WCRP Open Science Conference October 2011

Postdocs Applying Climate Expertise(PACE) seeking Organizational Partners

PSMI Publication on Best Practices for Process Studies released and has reached #6 on AMS most viewed list. (BAMS, July 2009)

 

More Announcements

Science Tidbits    

August 2010 - El Nino has grown more intense and shifted westward in last three decades, data show

New Western Boundary Current paper published - Role of Gulf Stream, Kuroshio-Oyashio and Their Extensions in Large-Scale Atmosphere-Ocean Interaction : A Review, J. Climate, 15 June 2010, Vol. 23, pp 3249-3281April 2010 - Surface Fluxes: Challenges for High Latitudes - presentations posted

 

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