Yang Shi

and 5 more

Meng Zhang

and 8 more

This study evaluates high-latitude stratiform mixed-phase clouds (SMPC) in the atmosphere model of the newly released Energy Exascale Earth System Model version 2 (EAMv2) by utilizing one-year-long ground-based remote sensing measurements from the U.S. Department of Energy Atmospheric Radiation and Measurement (ARM) Program. A nudging approach is applied to model simulations for a better comparison with the ARM observations. Observed and modeled SMPCs are collocated to evaluate their macro- and microphysical properties at the ARM North Slope of Alaska (NSA) site in the Arctic and the McMurdo (AWR) site in the Antarctic. We found that EAMv2 overestimates (underestimates) SMPC frequency of occurrence at the NSA (AWR) site nearly all year round. However, the model captures the observed larger cloud frequency of occurrence at the NSA site. For collocated SMPCs, the annual statistics of observed cloud macrophysics are generally reproduced at the NSA site, while at the AWR site, there are larger biases. Compared to the AWR site, the lower cloud boundaries and the warmer cloud top temperature observed at NSA are well simulated. On the other hand, simulated cloud phases are substantially biased at each location. The model largely overestimates liquid water path at NSA, whereas it is frequently underestimated at AWR. Meanwhile, the simulated ice water path is underestimated at NSA, but at AWR, it is comparable to observations. As a result, the observed hemispheric difference in cloud phase partitioning is misrepresented in EAMv2. This study implies that continuous improvement in cloud microphysics is needed for high-latitude mixed-phase clouds.

Jean-Christophe Golaz

and 70 more

This work documents version two of the Department of Energy’s Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM). E3SM version 2 (E3SMv2) is a significant evolution from its predecessor E3SMv1, resulting in a model that is nearly twice as fast and with a simulated climate that is improved in many metrics. We describe the physical climate model in its lower horizontal resolution configuration consisting of 110 km atmosphere, 165 km land, 0.5° river routing model, and an ocean and sea ice with mesh spacing varying between 60 km in the mid-latitudes and 30 km at the equator and poles. The model performance is evaluated by means of a standard set of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) Diagnosis, Evaluation, and Characterization of Klima (DECK) simulations augmented with historical simulations as well as simulations to evaluate impacts of different forcing agents. The simulated climate is generally realistic, with notable improvements in clouds and precipitation compared to E3SMv1. E3SMv1 suffered from an excessively high equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) of 5.3 K. In E3SMv2, ECS is reduced to 4.0 K which is now within the plausible range based on a recent World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) assessment. However, E3SMv2 significantly underestimates the global mean surface temperature in the second half of the historical record. An analysis of single-forcing simulations indicates that correcting the historical temperature bias would require a substantial reduction in the magnitude of the aerosol-related forcing.

Ching An Yang

and 4 more

An evaluation of three climate models is conducted using in situ airborne observations from the Southern Ocean Clouds, Radiation, Aerosol Transport Experimental Study (SOCRATES) campaign. The evaluation targets cloud phases, microphysical properties, thermodynamic conditions, and aerosol indirect effects at -40°C – 0°C. For cloud phase frequency distribution, the Community Atmosphere Model version 6 (CAM6) shows the most similar result to the observations, which allows more liquid-containing clouds below -10°C compared with its predecessor – CAM5. The Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) underestimates (overestimates) ice phase frequencies below (above) -20°C. Compared with 580-second averaged observations (i.e., 100 km horizontal scale), CAM6 and E3SM overestimate (underestimate) liquid (ice) water content (i.e., LWC and IWC), leading to lower a glaciation ratio when ice and liquid coexist. Thermodynamic conditions, specifically relative humidity (RH), is likely a key factor contributing to model cloud occurrence and cloud phase biases. Simulated in-cloud RH shows higher minimum values than observations, possibly restricting ice growth during sedimentation. As number concentrations of larger and smaller aerosols (> 500 nm and > 100 nm) increase, observations show increases in glaciation ratio, cloud fraction, LWC and liquid number concentration (Nliq) at -18°C to 0°C, and IWC and ice number concentration (Nice) at -35°C to 0°C. CAM6 and E3SM show slight increases of LWC and Nliq, and E3SM shows small increases of Nice. These results indicate that models underestimate aerosol indirect effects on ice and mixed phase clouds over the Southern Ocean.

Naruki Hiranuma

and 16 more

This poster presents immersion freezing efficiencies of ambient particles collected from different latitudes between 79 °N and 75 °S. We collected particles using aerosol impactors at five different geographic locations, including i) the Atlantic sector of the Arctic, ii) an urban area in Europe, iii) a rural location in the U.S., iv) a mid-latitude agricultural site in the U.S., and v) the Antarctica peninsula area around Weddell Sea, representing unique particle episodes and atmospheric conditions. Then, we used an offline droplet-freezing assay instrument to measure fine-temperature-resolved ice-nucleating particle (INP) concentrations at T > -25 °C (with a detection capability of >0.0001 per L of air) for each region. Our preliminary results show INP concentrations in polar regions are - as expected - lower compared to mid-latitudes. Low concentrations of high-latitude INPs have been reported in other previous studies (e.g., Bigg et al., 2001; Rogers, 1996; Fountain and Ohtake, 1985; Mason et al., 2015; Ardon-Dryer and Levin, 2014; Belosi and Santachiara, 2014). Another important observation is the high variability of mid-latitude INP concentrations. A difference in the aerosol episode and properties may be key for such a high variability in the mid-latitude region. The composition of INPs varies, but it typically includes dust-related minerals, pollution aerosol, biogenic nuclei and marine microlayers. It is therefore important to comprehensively study realistic representation of both INP concentration and composition (ultimately for model parameterization) and their relevance to the aerosol-cloud interactions with a better temporal resolution under different atmospheric states and a wider spatial coverage of INP sampling sites (see Fig. 1). References: Ardon-Dryer, K. and Levin, Z.: Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 5217-5231, 2014. Belosi, F., and Santachiara, G.: Atmos. Res., 145–146, 105–111, 2014. Bigg, E. K.: Tellus B, 48, 223–233, 1996. Fountain, A. G., and Ohtake, T.: 1985: Climate Appl. Meteor., 24, 377–382, 1985. Mason, R. H. et al.: Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 1637–1651, 2016. Rogers, D. C. et al.: J. Atmos. Oceanic Technol., 18, 725–741, 2001.

Meng Zhang

and 7 more

Significant changes are found in the modeled phase partitioning of Arctic mixed-phase clouds in the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) Atmosphere Model version 1 (EAMv1) compared to its predecessor, the Community Atmosphere Model version 5 (CAM5). In this study, we aim to understand how the changes in modeled mixed-phase cloud properties are attributed to the updates made in the EAMv1 physical parameterizations. Impacts of the Classical Nucleation Theory (CNT) ice nucleation scheme, the Cloud Layer Unified By Binormals (CLUBB) parameterization, and updated Morrison and Gettelman microphysical scheme (MG2) are examined. Sensitivity experiments using the short-term hindcast approach are performed to isolate the impact of these new features on simulated mixed-phase clouds. Results are compared to the DOE’s Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Mixed-Phase Arctic Cloud Experiment (M-PACE) observations. We find that mixed-phase clouds simulated in EAMv1 are overly dominated by supercooled liquid and cloud ice water is substantially underestimated. The individual change of physical parameterizations is found to decrease cloud ice water mass mixing ratio in EAMv1 simulated single-layer mixed-phase clouds. A budget analysis of detailed cloud microphysical processes suggests that the lack of ice particles that participate in the mass growth processes strongly inhibits the mass mixing ratio of cloud ice. The insufficient heterogeneous ice nucleation at temperatures warmer than -15C in CNT and the negligible ice processes in CLUBB are primarily responsible for the significant underestimation of cloud ice water content in the Arctic single-layer mixed-phase clouds.