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THE FPS-AEROSOL PROTOCOLS
The Med-CORDEX Flagship Pilot Study (FPS) aerosol is one of the FPS endorsed by CORDEX in 2016. It targets to study the role of the aerosols in shaping the regional climate of the Euro-Mediterranean region. To reach its scientific objectives, various experimental protocols have been proposed to the RCM community. These simulation protocols are proposed to explore the links between aerosols and climate in the Mediterranean region. They have been generally approved by the Med-CORDEX community (Mykonos (Sept 2015) and Barcelone (July 2017) workshops) and in the ChARMEX prospective document (2016).
Protocol 1 : External Aerosol Forcing
The goal of Protocol 1 is to evaluate the impact of aerosols on regional climate using non interactive aerosol climatologies (still widely used by the climate community). All regional climate models are welcome, especially the ones taking part in Med-CORDEX or Euro-CORDEX simulations !
This protocol consists in two different initiatives:
- 1A) the analysis of reanalyses-driven simulations to explore the role of aerosols on past and present day conditions
- 1B) the analysis of historical and future scenario simulations in order to assess the role of aerosols in future regional climate projections.
Some of the simulations are common with the Med-CORDEX or EURO-CORDEX protocols and may already exist.
Protocol 2 : Interactive aerosols
Fully interactive aerosol-climate RCMs, CTM and meso-scale models can participate here. The purpose is to evaluate and intercompare simulated aerosol cycle and impact simulations on different time windows. Groups are free to participate to a subset of the protocol only (e.g., CTM and meso-scale models).
Three types of simulations will be tested:
- 2A) Case studies coincident with field campaigns (TRAQA, ADRIMED, PEACETIME)
- 2B) Reanalysis-driven evaluation runs (e.g. ERA-Interim over the 1979-2017 period)
- 2C) Historical and projection runs with 2 RCP scenarios (2.6 and 8.5)
These simulations have to be run with a regional climate model including an interactive aerosol scheme, on an enlarged Med-CORDEX domain.
The list of participants to the different protocols can be found here.
The list of requested variables for the different simulations is available here.
Naming of output files
(to be confirmed during the next Med-CORDEX meeting in November 2019)
The syntax is based on the CORDEX syntax, in which the version (v1, v2, …) is replaced by a group of 3 elements, separated by “-”, and giving respectively the FPS (aer for FPS-aerosol), the simulation (1Aevo for the protocol 1A) and the version. Here are examples for each protocol:
Protocol 1A:
tas_MED-11_ECMWF-ERAINT_evaluation_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-1Aevo-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc (with evolving aerosols)
tas_MED-11_ECMWF-ERAINT_evaluation_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-1Acst-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc (with constant aerosols)
tas_MED-11_ECMWF-ERAINT_evaluation_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-1Ano-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc (without aerosols)
Protocol 1B:
tas_MED-11_CNRM-CERFACS-CNRM-CM5_rcp85_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-1Bevo-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc (with evolving aerosols)
tas_MED-11_CNRM-CERFACS-CNRM-CM5_rcp85_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-1Bcst-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc (with constant aerosols)
Protocol 2A:
tas_MED-11_ECMWF-ERAINT_evaluation_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-2Aevo-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc
Protocol 2B:
tas_MED-11_ECMWF-ERAINT_evaluation_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-2Bevo-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc
Protocol 2C:
tas_MED-11_CNRM-CERFACS-CNRM-CM5_rcp85_r1i1p1_CNRM-ALADIN63_aer-2Cevo-v1_day_20140101-20141231.nc
