Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “Global Model”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 1,405 records · Page 78

PM2.5 Variation Related to AOD and Meteorological Conditions on Diurnal Scale in Beijing, China

PM2.5 (particulate matter with diameter less than 2.5um) is one of the major air pollutants in many regions around the globe. Column integrated aerosol optical depth (AOD) measurement provides a potential way to estimate surface PM2.5 concentration from the remote sensing technics. In this analysis, we compiled hourly measurements of surface PM2.5 and AOD made in Beijing, China and meteorological conditions provided by NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office's Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA) product in recent years. On daily basis, hourly PM2.5 and AOD show positive correlation, i.e. correlation coefficient (R) is higher than 0.5 on about 50% of days. We apply multi-variant analysis to this dataset and estimate the magnitude of AOD variance that can be explained by or related to PM2.5 and relevant meteorological conditions changes.

PM2.5↗

The Version 3 OMI NO2 Standard Product

We describe the new version 3.0 NASA Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) standard nitrogen dioxide (NO2) products (SPv3). The products and documentation are publicly available from the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (https://disc.gsfc.nasa.gov/datasets/OMNO2_V003/summary/). The major improvements include (1) a new spectral fitting algorithm for NO2 slant column density (SCD) retrieval and (2) higher-resolution (1° latitude and 1.25° longitude) a priori NO2 and temperature profiles from the Global Modeling Initiative (GMI) chemistry–transport model with yearly varying emissions to calculate air mass factors (AMFs) required to convert SCDs into vertical column densities (VCDs). The new SCDs are systematically lower (by ∼10-40%) than previous, version 2, estimates. Most of this reduction in SCDs is propagated into stratospheric VCDs. Tropospheric NO2 VCDs are also reduced over polluted areas, especially over western Europe, the eastern US, and eastern China. Initial evaluation over unpolluted areas shows that the new SPv3 products agree better with independent satellite- and ground-based Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) measurements. However, further evaluation of tropospheric VCDs is needed over polluted areas, where the increased spatial resolution and more refined AMF estimates may lead to better characterization of pollution hot spots.

Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI)↗

Impact of Satellite Sea Surface Salinity Observations on ENSO Predictions from the GMAO Seasonal Forecast System

El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) has far reaching global climatic impacts and so extending useful ENSO forecasts would be of great benefit for society. However, one key variable that has yet to be fully exploited within coupled forecast systems is accurate estimation of near-surface ocean density. Satellite sea surface salinity (SSS), combined with temperature, help to identify ocean density changes and associated mixing near the ocean surface. We assess the impact of satellite SSS observations for improving near-surface dynamics within ocean analyses and how these impact dynamical ENSO forecasts using the NASA GMAO (Global Modeling and Assimilation Office) Sub-seasonal to Seasonal (S2S_v2.1) coupled forecast system (Molod et al. 2018 - i.e. NASA's contribution to the NMME (North American Multi-Model Ensemble) project). For all initialization experiments, all available along-track absolute dynamic topography and in situ observations are assimilated using the LETKF (Local Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter) scheme similar to Penny et al., 2013. A separate reanalysis additionally assimilates Aquarius V5 (September 2011 to June 2015) and SMAP (Soil Moisture Active Passive satellite) V4.1 (March 2015 to present) along-track data.We highlight the impact of satellite SSS on ocean reanalyses by comparing validation statistics of experiments that assimilate SSS versus our current prediction system that withholds SSS. We find that near-surface validation versus observed statistics for salinity are slightly degraded when assimilating SSS. This is an expected result due to known biases between SSS (measured by satellite at approximately 1-centimeter depth) and in situ measurements (typically measured by Argo floats at 3-meters depth). On the other hand, a very encouraging result is that both temperature, absolute dynamic topography, and mixed layer statistics are improved with SSS assimilation. Previous work has shown that correcting near-surface density structure via gridded SSS assimilation can improve coupled forecasts. Here we present results of coupled forecasts that are initialized from GMAO S2S spring reanalyses that assimilate/withhold along-track (L2) SSS. In particular, we contrast forecasts of the big 2015 El Nino, the 2017 La Nina and the 2018 weak El Nino. For each of these ENSO scenarios, assimilation of satellite SSS improves the forecast validation. Improved SSS and density upgrade the mixed layer depth leading to more accurate coupled air/sea interaction. From March to June 2015, the availability of two overlapping satellite SSS instruments, Aquarius and SMAP, allows a unique opportunity to compare and contrast forecasts initialized with the benefit of these two satellite SSS observation types. We assess the impact of gridded satellite sea surface salinity observations on dynamical ENSO forecasts for the big 2015 El Nino.

Hackert, E.↗

Emerging Capabilities Toward Decadal Prediction - NASA

NASA's interest and role in decadal prediction is described, along with the current capabilities and experience in prediction across weather to climate time scales. These activities span different NASA centers. In addition, plans for conducting decadal prediction at GMAO (Global Modeling and Assimilation Office) are presented, including an expansion of the present seasonal prediction system and the use of the newly developed Goddard Earth Observing System-Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean (GEOS-ECCO) system.

GEOS↗

Why Do Antarctic Ozone Recovery Trends Vary?

We use satellite ozone records and Global Modeling Initiative (GMI) chemistry transport model (CTM) simulations integrated with MERRA2 meteorology to identify a metric that accurately captures the trend in Antarctic ozone attributable to the decline in ozone depleting substances (ODSs). The GMI CTM Baseline simulation with realistically varying ODS levels closely matches observed interannual to decadal scale variations in Antarctic September ozone over the past 4 decades. The expected increase or recovery trend is obtained from the differences between the Baseline simulation and one with identical meteorology and fixed 1995 ODS levels. The differences show that vortex-averaged column O3 has the greatest sensitivity to ODS change from 1-20 Sep. The observed vortex-averaged column O3 during this period produces a trend consistent with the expected recovery attributable to ODS decline. Trends from dates after 20 Sep have smaller sensitivity to ODS decline and are more uncertain due to transport variability. Simulations show that the greatest decrease in O3 loss (i.e., recovery) occurs inside the vortex near the edge. The polar cap metrics have vortex size-dependent bias and do not consistently sample this region. Because the 60-90oS 220 DU O3 mass deficit (OMD) metric does not sample the edge region, its trend is lower than the expected trend; this is improved by area weighting. The 250 DU OMD metric samples more of the edge region, which increases its trend. Approximately 25% of the September Antarctic O3 increase is due to higher O3 levels in June prior to winter depletion.

Antarctic ozone↗

Optimizing Umkehr Ozone Profile Retrievals

NOAA Dobson Umkehr ozone profile records have been collected since the 1970s. Umkehr ozone profiles are used to monitor stratospheric ozone recovery predicted to occur by the 2050s. Current operational Dobson Umkehr profile algorithms produce data that have uncertainty on the order of ~ 5 % in the stratosphere. However, when large volcanic eruptions inject aerosols into the stratosphere, the errors can be as large as 70 %. In order to evaluate Umkehr records for aerosol-related and instrumental artifacts, we compare observations with a Hindcast simulation of the NASA Merra-2 Global Modeling Initiative (GMI) Replay (M2GMI, Orbe et al, 2017; Wargan et al, 2018) and Chemistry Transport Model (GMI CTM, Strahan et al, 2013, Strahan et al, 2016). The biases found between the models and observations are summarized for each Dobson calibration and volcanic eruption period, thus providing a reference tool for homogenization of the Umkehr time series and removal of volcanic aerosol errors.

Petropavlovskikh, I.↗

Joint Assimilation of the Aura Microwave Limb Sounder and Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite Limb Profiler Data: Towards a Reanalysis of Stratospheric Ozone for Trend Studies

The future trajectory of the stratospheric ozone recovery will be sensitive to greenhouse gas concentrations through thermal control of chemical loss and via stratospheric circulation changes. The latter in particular is subject to considerable uncertainty meriting continuing monitoring of the evolution of ozone throughout the depth of the stratosphere. Atmospheric reanalyses utilize the data assimilation methodology to obtain comprehensive representations of the state of the atmosphere, including its composition, on multidecadal scales by combining diverse measurements from satellite-borne and conventional data sources. Systematic biases among these various data types pose a challenge for assimilation by introducing spurious discontinuities that affect the utility of reanalyses for studies of long-term variability and trends.In this presentation we will outline an approach, developed at NASA's Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO), that allows joint assimilation of stratospheric ozone profiles from the Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) on EOS Aura and the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite Limb Profiler (OMPS-LP) currently flying on the Suomi-NPP satellite with future missions projected into the 2030s. We will demonstrate that a simple offline correction significantly reduces biases between MLS and OMPS-LP ozone data providing a strategy for generating a long-term vertically resolved homogenized representation of stratospheric ozone in future reanalyses. One novel element of our approach compared to previous GMAO reanalysis is the use of a version of the Goddard Earth Observing System model with full stratospheric chemistry. We will show selected comparisons of MLS and OMPS-LP assimilation experiments with independent ozonesonde and satellite data as well as two examples of process-based evaluation focused on the 2016 QBO disruption and Arctic winter ozone loss focusing on the relative performance of the MLS and OMPS-LP analyses.

Wargan, K.↗

Designing an Optimal Ensemble Strategy for GMAO S2S Forecast System

The NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) Sub-seasonal to Seasonal (S2S) prediction system is being readied for a major upgrade. An important factor in successful extended range forecasting is the definition of the ensemble. Our overall strategy is to run a relatively large ensemble of about 40 members up to 3 months (focusing on the sub-seasonal forecast problem), after which we sub-sample the ensemble, and continue the forecast with about 10 members (up to 12 months). Here we present the results of our testing of various ways to generate the initial perturbations and the validation of a stratified sampling approach for choosing the members of the smaller ensemble. For the initialization of the ensemble we propose a combination of lagged and burst initial conditions. To generate perturbations for the burst ensemble members we used scaled differences of pairs of analysis states (chosen randomly from the corresponding season) separated by 1-10 days. We consider perturbing separately the atmosphere and the ocean, or both. By varying the separation times between the analysis states, we are able to produce perturbations that resemble well-known modes of variability. Focusing on the ENSO SST indices, we found that all types of perturbations are important for the ensemble spread with, however, considerable differences in the timing of the impacts on spread for the atmospheric and oceanic perturbations.Our initial (larger) ensemble size was determined so as to maximize the skill of predicting some of the leading modes of boreal winter atmospheric modes (namely the NAO, PNA and AO). Since it is not feasible for us to run with the larger ensemble beyond about 3 months, we employ a stratified sampling procedure that identifies the emerging directions of error growth to subset the ensemble. By comparing the results from the stratified ensemble with that of the randomly sampled ensemble of the same size, we find that the former provides substantially better estimates the mean of the original large ensemble.

Borovikov, Anna↗

GEOS S2S Version 3: The New NASA/GMAO High Resolution Seasonal Prediction System

The NASA/Goddard Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) released Version 2 of the Subseasonal to Seasonal (GEOS-S2S) forecast system in the fall of 2017, and it has been producing near-real time subseasonal to seasonal forecasts and a weakly coupled atmosphere-ocean data assimilation record since then. A new version of the coupled modeling and analysis system (Version 3) was released by the GMAO at the end of 2019. The new version runs at higher oceanic resolution than the previous (approximately 1/2 degree for the atmosphere, 1/4 degree for the ocean), and includes interactive earth system model components not typically present in seasonal prediction systems (two moment cloud microphysics for aerosol indirect effect and an interactive aerosol model). The weakly coupled atmosphere-ocean data assimilation system now includes assimilation of sea surface salinity, that has been shown to result in improved ocean mixed layer simulation and ENSO prediction skill.

Molod, Andrea↗

Toward Coupled Data Assimilation in NASA’s GEOS: Developments in the Ocean Context

The Global Modeling & Assimilation Office (GMAO) at NASA GSFC produces analyses and predictions of the Earth system using various configurations of the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) model and assimilation system. The current sub-seasonal-to-seasonal prediction system (GEOS-S2S) is based on a coupled atmosphere-ocean-land-ice configuration of GEOS which includes the Modular Ocean Model version 5 (MOM5) run at approximately 50-km resolution and a de-coupled OI-based ocean analysis that uses an initialization of MOM5 forced by the MERRA-2 reanalysis. GMAO will soon implement an updated GEOS-S2S system that will run at 25-km resolution and adopt aspects of the hybrid four-dimensional ensemble-variational (H4DEnVar) system already running in the production-version atmospheric analysis system, including a Local Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter (LETKF) to provide initial conditions for the oceanic state. This presentation will focus on developments to sustain the GMAO's systems on longer time horizons, where more radical transformations will be required to adapt to advanced computing environments, higher resolution and more diverse model components, and new observations for the Earth system. Results will describe progress toward a version of the GEOS coupled system that will be based around the Joint Effort for Data assimilation Integration (JEDI) framework being developed within Joint Center for Satellite Data Assimilation (JCSDA) and include an updated ocean model, MOM6. Discussion will focus specifically on the use of a Unified Forward Operator (UFO) for simulating observations and the Object Oriented Prediction System (OOPS) for providing the state estimate. These features are being developed as a multi-agency effort under the auspices of the JCSDA and are being adopted in the GMAO for all its applications of coupled data assimilation including S2S, numerical weather prediction, and reanalysis.

Mahajan, Rahul↗

Dynamical Forecasts of Tropical Terrestrial Carbon Fluxes with the NASA S2S Retrospective Forecast System

Recent advances in the ability to predict climate anomalies at sub-seasonal to seasonal (S2S) timescales allow us to explore the possibility of forecasting carbon flux anomalies. Although carbon flux forecasting is a relatively new concept, it is potentially beneficial as it can help us better understand global and regional land-atmosphere carbon feedbacks associated with climate variations and can provide guidance for future field mission design. Here we evaluate the skill of forecasted terrestrial carbon anomalies generated from meteorological anomalies produced with the NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) S2S forecast system. We focus here on three representative time periods (the most recent 2015-2016 El Nino, 2011 La Nina, and 2014 as a neutral year), with each corresponding 9-month forecast comprising four ensemble members initialized in the preceding December. The meteorological variables produced by the GMAO forecast system were bias-corrected using a climatology derived from the Modern Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2) before being used to drive a suite of offline simulations with the NASA Catchment-CN terrestrial biosphere model, a model that computes water-energy-carbon dynamics. Forecasts are evaluated by comparing against satellite-driven estimates of gross primary production (GPP) and inverse model estimates of net carbon flux that incorporate satellite carbon dioxide measurements. We find that the restrospectively predicted carbon fluxes in the tropics reasonably reproduce the signs and magnitudes of the observed anomalies between the 2015-2016 El Nino and the 2011 La Nina for both net flux and GPP. For instance, for the El Nino period, the magnitude of the forecasted negative GPP anomaly in the South American tropics (which undergoes anomalously warm and dry conditions) agrees with the observed GPP anomaly at leads of up to three or four months. Overall, this study demonstrates potential skill in the forecast of biospheric carbon fluxes a few months in advance, a capability that could contribute to attribution studies focusing on carbon flux variations and support innovative observation strategies in the future.

Lee, Eunjee↗

An Introduction to the NASA GMAO Coupled Atmosphere-Ocean System - GEOS-S2S Version 3

Recently NASA's Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) has developed a new Subseasonal to Seasonal Prediction system Version 3 (GEOS-S2S-3). This upgrade replaces the GEOS-S2S-2 which is NASA's current contribution to the North American Multi-Model Experiment seasonal prediction project (Kirtman et al., 2014). The main improvements for our S2S-3 system include 1) a higher resolution MOM5 (Griffies et al., 2005) ocean model (now 0.25o x 0.25o x 50 layers), 2) an improved atmospheric/ocean interface layer (Akella and Suarez, 2018), and 3) assimilation of a long-track satellite salinity into the ocean model (Hackert et al, 2019). Atmospheric forcing is provided by the NASA MERRA-2 reanalysis (Gelaro et al., 2017). Initialization for the ocean relies on the GMAO ocean reanalysis system which assimilates all available in situ temperature and salinity, satellite sea surface salinity, and sea level using the Local Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter (LETKF) implementation of (Penny et al., 2013) on a 5 day assimilation cycle with 20 fixed ensemble members.In this presentation, we will authenticate our new S2S-3 ocean reanalysis using standard GODAE validation metrics. For example, we will compare gridded fields of mean and standard deviation of the ocean reanalysis versus observed fields. We will show correlation/RMS of model versus observations and temperature and salinity mean profiles for the various basins and latitude bands. Basin-scale volume transports, such as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation and the Indonesian Throughflow will be validated. Equatorial ocean waves will be compared by decomposing sea level into Kelvin and Rossby components. For each of these metrics, we plan to validate the results and then compare our new S2S-3 against the current production version, S2S-2. Finally, we will compare 9-month seasonal forecasts initialized from these two systems for the tropical Pacific NINO3.4 region over the period 1981-present.

Molod, Andrea↗

Aerosols in the atmosphere: Sources, transport, and multi-decadal trends

We present our recent studies with global modeling and analysis of atmospheric aerosols. We have used the Goddard Chemistry Aerosol Radiation and Transport (GOCART) model and satellite and in-situ data to investigate (1) long-term variations of aerosols over polluted and dust source regions and downwind ocean areas in the past three decades and the cause of the changes, (2) anthropogenic and volcanic contributions to the sulfate aerosol in the upper tropospherelower stratosphere, and (3) intercontinental transport of aerosols and its possible influence on regional air qualiy and climate.

Mian Chin↗

TPSAS-NF1676L-32099-DND

This talk provides a short overview of the new POWER web site that provides data parameters to energy sector societal benefit areas from NASA research projects. The NASA research projects include the GEWEX Surface Radiation Budget project, the CERES Fast Shortwave and Longwave radiative flux project (FLASHFlux) and NASA Goddard's Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) MERRA-2 atmospheric reanalysis. Data products are customized to the energy industry and make products available from the daily time scale to long-term climatological averages. The web services allow uses to choose multiple parameters and obtain the data in multiple file formats. This short talk is designed to be delivered at the NASA booth area at the 2018 Fall American Geophysical Union conference.

Paul W Stackhouse, Jr.↗

Observing System Simulation Experiments Investigating Atmospheric Motion Vectors and Radiances from a Constellation of 4-5 μm Infrared Sounders

A set of Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSEs) was performed to investigate the utility of a constellation of passive infrared spectrometers, strategically designed with the aim of deriving the three-dimensional retrievals of the horizontal wind via atmospheric motion vectors (AMVs) from instruments with the spectral resolution of an infrared sounder. The instrument and constellation designs were performed in the context of the Midwave Infrared Sounding of Temperature and humidity in a Constellation for Winds, or MISTiC Winds. The Global Modeling and Assimilation Office OSSE system, which includes a full suite of operational meteorological observations, served as the control. To illustrate the potential impact of this observing strategy, two experiments were performed by adding the new simulated observations to the control. First, perfect (error-free) simulated AMVs and radiances were assimilated. Second, the data were made imperfect by adding realistic modeled errors to the AMVs and radiances that were assimilated. The experimentation showed beneficial impacts on both the mass and wind fields, as based on analysis verification, forecast verification, and the assessment of the observations using the Forecast Sensitivity to Observation Impact (FSOI) metric. In all variables and metrics, the impacts of the imperfect observations were smaller than those of the perfect observations, though much of the positive benefit was retained. The FSOI metric illustrated two key points. First, the largest impacts were seen in the middle troposphere AMVs, which is a targeted capability of the constellation strategy. Second, the addition of modeled errors showed that the assimilation system was unable to fully exploit the 4.3 μm carbon dioxide absorption radiances.

Will McCarty↗

Cascading toward a Kilometer‐scale GCM: Impacts of a Scale‐aware Convection Parameterization in the Goddard Earth Observing System GCM.

The NASA Goddard Earth Observing System global model is evaluated through a cascade of simulations with increasing horizontal resolution. This model employs a non-hydrostatic dynamical core and includes a scale-aware, deep convection parameterization (DPCP). 40-daysimulations at six resolutions (100km to 3km) with unvarying model formulation were produced. At the highest resolution, extreme experiments were carried out; one with no DPCP, and one with its scale-awareness eliminated. Simulated precipitation, radiative balance, and atmospheric thermodynamic and dynamical variables are well reproduced with respect to both observational and reanalysis data. As model resolution increases, the convective precipitation smoothly transitions from being mostly produced by the convection parameterization to the cloud microphysics parameterization. However, contrary to current thought, these extreme cases argue for maintaining, to some extent, the scale-aware deep convection parameterization even at 3kmscale, as the run relying solely on explicit grid-scale production of rainfall performs more poorly at this resolution.

Saulo Freitas↗

Disentangling the Drivers of the Summertime Ozone‐Temperature Relationship Over the United States

Summertime surface-level ozone (O3 ) is known to vary with temperature, but the relative roles of different processes responsible for causing the O3 -temperature relationship are not well quantified. In this study we use simulations of NASA's Global Modeling Initiative (GMI) chemical transport model (CTM) to isolate and assess the relative impact of atmospheric transport, chemistry, and emissions on O3 variability, events, and its correlation with temperature. Using observations from CASTNet in the contiguous United States, we show that the GMI CTM reproduces the spatiotemporal variability of O3 and the O3 -temperature relationship during the summer. We primarily focus on the total change in O3 due to a change in temperature (d O3 /d T). In regions with strong positive correlations between temperature and O3 such as the Northeast, Great Lakes, and Great Plains, temperature's association with transport primarily drives d O3 /d T with smaller contributions from temperature-dependent chemistry and anthropogenic emissions. There are regions, however, with near-zero correlation between temperature and O3 , and our findings suggest that transport is still an important driver of O3 variability in these regions, albeit not correlated with temperature. Transport is not directly dependent on temperature but rather is linked through an indirect association, and it is therefore important to understand the exact mechanisms that link transport to O3 and how these mechanisms will change in a warming world.

ozone, temperature, CTM↗

Observing System Simulation Experiments Investigating Atmospheric Motion Vectors and Radiances from a Constellation of 4–5-μm Infrared Sounders

A set of observing system simulation experiments (OSSEs) was performed to investigate the utility of a constellation of passive infrared spectrometers, strategically designed with the aim of deriving the three-dimensional retrievals of the horizontal wind via atmospheric motion vectors (AMVs) from instruments with the spectral resolution of an infrared sounder. The instrument and constellation designs were performed in the context of the Midwave Infrared Sounding of Temperature and humidity in a Constellation for Winds (MISTiC Winds). The Global Modeling and Assimilation Office OSSE system, which includes a full suite of operational meteorological observations, served as the control. To illustrate the potential impact of this observing strategy, two experiments were performed by adding the new simulated observations to the control. First, perfect (error free) simulated AMVs and radiances were assimilated. Second, the data were made imperfect by adding realistic modeled errors to the AMVs and radiances that were assimilated. The experimentation showed beneficial impacts on both the mass and wind fields, as based on analysis verification, forecast verification, and the assessment of the observations using the forecast sensitivity to observation impact (FSOI) metric. In all variables and metrics, the impacts of the imperfect observations were smaller than those of the perfect observations, although much of the positive benefit was retained. The FSOI metric illustrated two key points. First, the largest impacts were seen in the middle troposphere AMVs, which is a targeted capability of the constellation strategy. Second, the addition of modeled errors showed that the assimilation system was unable to fully exploit the 4.3-μm carbon dioxide absorption radiances.

Will McCarty↗