Identification

Title

Evaluation of WRF model output for severe-weather forecasting from the 2008 NOAA Hazardous Weather Testbed Spring Experiment

Abstract

This study assesses forecasts of the preconvective and near-storm environments from the convection-allowing models run for the 2008 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Hazardous Weather Testbed (HWT) spring experiment. Evaluating the performance of convection-allowing models (CAMs) is important for encouraging their appropriate use and development for both research and operations. Systematic errors in the CAM forecasts included a cold bias in mean 2-m and 850-hPa temperatures over most of the United States and smaller than observed vertical wind shear and 850-hPa moisture over the high plains. The placement of airmass boundaries was similar in forecasts from the CAMs and the operational North American Mesoscale (NAM) model that provided the initial and boundary conditions. This correspondence contributed to similar characteristics for spatial and temporal mean error patterns. However, substantial errors were found in the CAM forecasts away from airmass boundaries. The result is that the deterministic CAMs do not predict the environment as well as the NAM. It is suggested that parameterized processes used at convection-allowing grid lengths, particularly in the boundary layer, may be contributing to these errors. It is also shown that mean forecasts from an ensemble of CAMs were substantially more accurate than forecasts from deterministic CAMs. If the improvement seen in the CAM forecasts when going from a deterministic framework to an ensemble framework is comparable to improvements in mesoscale model forecasts when going from a deterministic to an ensemble framework, then an ensemble of mesoscale model forecasts could predict the environment even better than an ensemble of CAMs. Therefore, it is suggested that the combination of mesoscale (convection parameterizing) and CAM configurations is an appropriate avenue to explore for optimizing the use of limited computer resources for severe weather forecasting applications.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7n29xf4

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

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Temporal reference

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End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2010-04-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

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Conformity

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Constraints related to access and use

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Use constraints

Copyright 2010 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be "fair use" under Section 107 or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law (17 USC, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the Society's permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form on servers, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statements, requires written permission or license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policies, available from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or amspubs@ametsoc.org. Permission to place a copy of this work on this server has been provided by the AMS. The AMS does not guarantee that the copy provided here is an accurate copy of the published work.

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact