2 research outputs found
Robust skill of decadal climate predictions
There is a growing need for skilful predictions of climate up to a decade ahead. Decadal climate predictions show high skill for surface temperature, but confidence in forecasts of precipitation and atmospheric circulation is much lower. Recent advances in seasonal and annual prediction show that the signal-to-noise ratio can be too small in climate models, requiring a very large ensemble to extract the predictable signal. Here, we reassess decadal prediction skill using a much larger ensemble than previously available, and reveal significant skill for precipitation over land and atmospheric circulation, in addition to surface temperature. We further propose a more powerful approach than used previously to evaluate the benefit of initialisation with observations, improving our understanding of the sources of skill. Our results show that decadal climate is more predictable than previously thought and will aid society to prepare for, and adapt to, ongoing climate variability and change.D.M.S., A.A.S., N.J.D., L.H. and R.E. were supported by the Met Office Hadley Centre
Climate Programme funded by BEIS and Defra and by the European Commission
Horizon 2020 EUCP project (GA 776613). L.P.C. was supported by the Spanish
MINECO HIATUS (CGL2015-70353-R) project. F.J.D.R. was supported by the H2020
EUCP (GA 776613) and the Spanish MINECO CLINSA (CGL2017-85791-R) projects. W.A.
M. and H.P. were supported by the German Ministry of Education and Research
(BMBF) under the project MiKlip (grant 01LP1519A). The NCAR contribution was
supported by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Climate Program Office under Climate Variability and Predictability Program Grant
NA13OAR4310138 and by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) Collaborative
Research EaSM2 Grant OCE-1243015. The NCAR contribution is also based upon work
supported by NCAR, which is a major facility sponsored by the US NSF under
Cooperative Agreement No. 1852977. The Community Earth System Model Decadal
Prediction Large Ensemble (CESM-DPLE) was generated using computational
resources provided by the US National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center,
which is supported by the Office of Science of the US Department of Energy under
Contract DE-AC02-05CH11231, as well as by an Accelerated Scientific Discovery grant
for Cheyenne (https://doi.org/10.5065/D6RX99HX) that was awarded by NCAR’s
Computational and Information System Laboratory.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version
Robust skill of decadal climate predictions
There is a growing need for skilful predictions of climate up to a decade ahead. Decadal climate predictions show high skill for surface temperature, but confidence in forecasts of precipitation and atmospheric circulation is much lower. Recent advances in seasonal and annual prediction show that the signal-to-noise ratio can be too small in climate models, requiring a very large ensemble to extract the predictable signal. Here, we reassess decadal prediction skill using a much larger ensemble than previously available, and reveal significant skill for precipitation over land and atmospheric circulation, in addition to surface temperature. We further propose a more powerful approach than used previously to evaluate the benefit of initialisation with observations, improving our understanding of the sources of skill. Our results show that decadal climate is more predictable than previously thought and will aid society to prepare for, and adapt to, ongoing climate variability and change.D.M.S., A.A.S., N.J.D., L.H. and R.E. were supported by the Met Office Hadley Centre
Climate Programme funded by BEIS and Defra and by the European Commission
Horizon 2020 EUCP project (GA 776613). L.P.C. was supported by the Spanish
MINECO HIATUS (CGL2015-70353-R) project. F.J.D.R. was supported by the H2020
EUCP (GA 776613) and the Spanish MINECO CLINSA (CGL2017-85791-R) projects. W.A.
M. and H.P. were supported by the German Ministry of Education and Research
(BMBF) under the project MiKlip (grant 01LP1519A). The NCAR contribution was
supported by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Climate Program Office under Climate Variability and Predictability Program Grant
NA13OAR4310138 and by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) Collaborative
Research EaSM2 Grant OCE-1243015. The NCAR contribution is also based upon work
supported by NCAR, which is a major facility sponsored by the US NSF under
Cooperative Agreement No. 1852977. The Community Earth System Model Decadal
Prediction Large Ensemble (CESM-DPLE) was generated using computational
resources provided by the US National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center,
which is supported by the Office of Science of the US Department of Energy under
Contract DE-AC02-05CH11231, as well as by an Accelerated Scientific Discovery grant
for Cheyenne (https://doi.org/10.5065/D6RX99HX) that was awarded by NCAR’s
Computational and Information System Laboratory.Peer Reviewe