Simulating the variability and physics of Atlantic Tropical Cyclones with the Canadian RCM

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Simulating the variability and physics of
Atlantic Tropical Cyclones with the Canadian RCM

• Louis-Philippe Caron
• and
• Colin Jones

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• Objectives
• Evaluate the benefit of increased resolution in
  TC simulation on climate timescales.
• Investigate the importance of simulating African
  waves, at high-resolution, in the context of
  Atlantic TC variability.
• These goals will be achieved by using different
  possible configurations of GEM-Climate
• A global 2resolution, typical of present-day
  GCMs.
• Variable resolution, with high-resolution (0.3)
  over the entire tropical Atlantic TC track, while
  the rest of the global domain is kept at the
  equivalent resolution of the Global version of
  GEM (2).
• Two different RCM configurations of GEM the
  first utilizes a domain covering the same area
  and resolution as the high-resolution portion of
  the Global variable resolution simulation whilst
  the second, smaller RCM domain, covers only the
  tropical Atlantic.

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Example of Variable Resolution Grid
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• Relative monthly distribution of observed and
  simulated TCs for the period 1979-2006.
• Hurricane simulated in the Gulf of Mexico.
• TCs tracks produced by GEM during a given year.