Randall, David A | Engineering Papers

DOE OSTI2011

Efficient data IO for a Parallel Global Cloud Resolving Model

Execution of a Global Cloud Resolving Model (GCRM) at target resolutions of 2-4 km will generate, at a minimum, 10s of Gigabytes of data per variable per snapshot. Writing this data to disk without creating a serious bottleneck in the execution of the GCRM code while also supporting efficient post-execution data analysis is a significant challenge. This paper discusses an Input/Output (IO) application programmer interface (API) for the GCRM that efficiently moves data from the model to disk while maintaining support for community standard formats, avoiding the creation of very large numbers of files, and supporting efficient analysis. Several aspects of the API will be discussed in detail. First, we discuss the output data layout which linearizes the data in a consistent way that is independent of the number of processors used to run the simulation and provides a convenient format for subsequent analyses of the data. Second, we discuss the flexible API interface that enables modelers to easily add variables to the output stream by specifying where in the GCRM code these variables are located and to flexibly configure the choice of outputs and distribution of data across files. The flexibility of the API is designed to allow model developers to add new data fields to the output as the model develops and new physics is added and also provides a mechanism for allowing users of the GCRM code itself to adjust the output frequency and the number of fields written depending on the needs of individual calculations. Third, we describe the mapping to the NetCDF data model with an emphasis on the grid description. Fourth, we describe our messaging algorithms and IO aggregation strategies that are used to achieve high bandwidth while simultaneously writing concurrently from many processors to shared files. We conclude with initial performance results.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗

DOE OSTI2011

Tropical and subtropical cloud transitions in weather and climate prediction models: the GCSS/WGNE Pacific Cross-Section Intercomparison (GPCI)

A model evaluation approach is proposed where weather and climate prediction models are analyzed along a Pacific Ocean cross-section, from the stratocumulus regions off the coast of California, across the shallow convection dominated trade-winds, to the deep convection regions of the ITCZ: the GCSS/WGNE Pacific Cross-section Intercomparison (GPCI). The main goal of GPCI is to evaluate, and help understand and improve the representation of tropical and sub-tropical cloud processes in weather and climate prediction models. In this paper, a detailed analysis of cloud regime transitions along the cross-section from the sub-tropics to the tropics for the season JJA of 1998 is presented. This GPCI study confirms many of the typical weather and climate prediction model problems in the representation of clouds: underestimation of clouds in the stratocumulus regime by most models with the corresponding consequences in terms of shortwave radiation biases; overestimation of clouds by the ECMWF Re-Analysis (ERA40) in the deep tropics (in particular) with the corresponding impact in the outgoing longwave radiation; large spread between the different models in terms of cloud cover, liquid water path and shortwave radiation; significant differences between the models in terms of vertical crosssections of cloud properties (in particular), vertical velocity and relative humidity. An alternative analysis of cloud cover mean statistics is proposed where sharp gradients in cloud cover along the GPCI transect are taken into account. This analysis shows that the negative cloud bias of some models and ERA40 in the stratocumulus regions (as compared to ISCCP) is associated not only with lower values of cloud cover in these regimes, but also with a stratocumulus-to-cumulus transition that occurs too early along the trade-wind Lagrangian trajectory. Histograms of cloud cover along the cross-section differ significantly between models. Some models exhibit a quasi-bimodal structure with cloud cover being either very large (close to 100%) or very small, while other models show a more continuous transition. The ISCCP observations suggest that reality is in-between these two extreme examples. These different patterns reflect the diverse nature of the cloud, boundary layer, and convection parameterizations in the participating weather and climate prediction models.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗