Attribution of multi-annual to decadal changes in the climate system: The Large Ensemble Single Forcing Model Intercomparison Project (LESFMIP)

Smith, D. M., Gillett, N. P., Simpson, I. R., Athanasiadis, P. J., Baehr, J., Bethke, I., Bilge, T. A., Bonnet, R., Boucher, O., Findell, K. L., Gastineau, G., Gualdi, S., Hermanson, L., Leung, L. R., Mignot, J., Müller, W. A., Osprey, S., Otterå, O. H., Persad, G. G., Scaife, A. A., Schmidt, G. A., Shiogama, H., Sutton, R. T. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8345-8583, Swingedouw, D., Yang, S., Zhou, T. and Ziehn, T. (2022) Attribution of multi-annual to decadal changes in the climate system: The Large Ensemble Single Forcing Model Intercomparison Project (LESFMIP). Frontiers in Climate, 4. 955414. ISSN 2624-9553 doi: 10.3389/fclim.2022.955414

Abstract/Summary

Multi-annual to decadal changes in climate are accompanied by changes in extreme events that cause major impacts on society and severe challenges for adaptation. Early warnings of such changes are now potentially possible through operational decadal predictions. However, improved understanding of the causes of regional changes in climate on these timescales is needed both to attribute recent events and to gain further confidence in forecasts. Here we document the Large Ensemble Single Forcing Model Intercomparison Project that will address this need through coordinated model experiments enabling the impacts of different external drivers to be isolated. We highlight the need to account for model errors and propose an attribution approach that exploits differences between models to diagnose the real-world situation and overcomes potential errors in atmospheric circulation changes. The experiments and analysis proposed here will provide substantial improvements to our ability to understand near-term changes in climate and will support the World Climate Research Program Lighthouse Activity on Explaining and Predicting Earth System Change.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/107611
Identification Number/DOI	10.3389/fclim.2022.955414
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Uncontrolled Keywords	Climate, decadal climate, attribution, external forcings, large ensembles, model intercomparison, Lighthouse Activity
Publisher	Frontiers Media S.A.
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