A study of precipitation extremes and their climate connections using a phenomena-based method

Abstract:

In this study, I will provide an analysis of precipitation extremes simulated by the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory's (GFDL) new high resolution global climate model used for GFDL's participation in CMIP6 High Resolution Model Intercomparison Project (HighResMIP). I will quantify the extent to which the model simulated precipitation extremes as measured by precipitation 99th percentile are due to weather phenomena such as the atmospheric rivers (AR) and tropical cyclones (TC). Both weather phenomena are objectively identified and tracked using high frequency model output. The identified objects are subsequently used to conditionally sample various meteorological fields associated with the extreme weather. These fields are then used to assess the contribution of the weather extremes to global top-of-atmosphere radiative budget, meridional water transport as well as the climate impact on the weather extremes themselves with a goal of understanding the connections between these weather extremes and climate change.