Performance comparison of some dynamical and empirical downscaling methods for South Africa from a seasonal climate modelling perspective

International Journal of Climatology

Volumn 29, Issue 11, 2009, Pages 1535-1549

  Landman, Willem A ^a,b   Kgatuke, Mary Jane ^a   Mbedzi, Maluta ^a   Beraki, Asmerom ^a   Bartman, Anna ^a   du Piesanie, Annelise ^a  

^a SOUTH AFRICAN WEATHER SERVICE   (South Africa)

^b UNIVERSITY OF PRETORIA   (South Africa)

Author keywords

Downscaling; General circulation model; Model output statistics; Regional climate model; South Africa

Indexed keywords

DOWNSCALING; GENERAL CIRCULATION MODEL; MODEL OUTPUT STATISTICS; REGIONAL CLIMATE MODEL; SOUTH AFRICA;

ATMOSPHERIC TEMPERATURE; ATMOSPHERICS; CLIMATOLOGY; FORECASTING; RAIN; SUBMARINE GEOPHYSICS;

SIMULATORS;

CLIMATE MODELING; CLIMATE PREDICTION; DOWNSCALING; EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS; FORECASTING METHOD; GENERAL CIRCULATION MODEL; RAINFALL; REGIONAL CLIMATE; SEA SURFACE TEMPERATURE; SEASONAL VARIATION; TEMPERATURE ANOMALY;

AFRICA; SOUTH AFRICA; SOUTHERN AFRICA; SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA;

EID: 70349223924     PISSN: 08998418     EISSN: 10970088     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1002/joc.1766     Document Type: Article

References (66)

1. Anthes RA, Kuo Y-H, Hsie E-Y, Low-Nam S, Bettge TW. 1989. Estimation of skill and uncertainty in regional numerical models. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society 115: 763-806.
2. Barnston AG. 1994. Linear statistical short-term climate predictive skill in the Northern hemisphere. Journal of Climate 7: 1513-1564.
3. Barnett TP, Preisendorfer RW. 1987. Origins and levels of monthly and seasonal forecast skill for United States air temperature determined by canonical correlation analysis. Monthly Weather Review 115: 1825-1850.
4. Bromwich DH, Bai L, Bjarnason GG. 2005. High resolution regional climate simulations over Iceland using polar MM5. Monthly Weather Review 133: 3527-3547.
5. Chouinard C, Mailhot J, Mitchell HL, Staniford A, Hogue T. 1994. The Canadian regional data assimilation system: operational and research applications. Monthly Weather Review 122: 1306-1325.
6. Coelho CAS, Stephenson DB, Balmaseda M, Doblas-Reyes FJ, van Oldenborgh GJ. 2006. Toward and integrated seasonal forecasting system for South America. Journal of Climate 19: 3704-3721.
7. Cook C, Reason CJC, Hewiston BC. 2004. Wet and dry spells within particularly wet and dry summers in the South African summer rainfall region. Climate Research 26: 17-31.
8. Copsey D, Sutton R, Knight JR. 2006. Recent trends in sea level pressure in the Indian Ocean region. Geophysical Research Letters 33: L19712, DOI: 10.1029/2006GL027175.
9. D'Abreton PC, Lindesay JA. 1992. Water vapour transport over south ern Africa during wet and dry early and late summer months. Inter national Journal of Climatology 13: 151-170.
10. Fennessy MJ, Shukla J. 2000. Seasonal prediction over North America with a regional model nested in a global model. Journal of Climate 13: 2605-2627.
11. Giorgi F. 1990. Simulation of regional climate using a limited area model nested in a general circulation model. Journal of Climate 3: 941-964.
12. Giorgi F, Bi X. 2000. A study of the internal variability of a regional climate model. Journal of Geophysical Research 105: 29503-29521.
13. Giorgi F, Mearns LO. 1999. Introduction to special section: regional climate modelling revisited. Journal of Geophysical Research 104: 6335-6351.
14. Giorgi F, Marinucci MR, Bates GT. 1993a. Development of a second- generation regional climate model (RegCM2). Part I: Boundary- layer and radiative transfer processes. Monthly Weather Review 121: 2794-2813.
15. Giorgi F, Marinucci MR, Bates GT, De Canio G. 1993b. Development of a second-generation regional climate model (RegCM2). Part II: Convective processes and assimilation of lateral boundary conditions. Monthly Weather Review 121: 2814-2832.
16. Giorgi F, Mearns LO, Shields C, Mayer L. 1996. A regional model study of the importance of local versus remote controls of the 1988 drought and the 1993 flood over the central United States. Journal of Climate 9: 1150-1162.
17. Glahn HR, Lowry DA. 1972. The use of model output statistics (MOS) in objective weather forecasting. Journal of Applied Meteorology 11: 1203-1211.
18. Goddard LM, Graham NE. 1999. The importance of the Indian Ocean for simulating rainfall anomalies over eastern and southern Africa. Journal of Geophysical Research 104: 19099-19116.
19. Goddard L, Mason SJ, Zebiak SE, Ropelewski CF, Basher R, Cane MA. 2001. Current approaches to seasonal-to-interannual climate predictions. International Journal of Climatology 21: 1111-1152.
20. Gong X, Barnston AG, Ward MN. 2003. The effect of spatial aggregation on the skill of seasonal precipitation forecasts. Journal of Climate 16: 3059-3071.
21. Grell G. 1993. Prognostic evaluation of assumptions used by cumulus parameterization. Monthly Weather Review 121: 764-787.
22. Grell GA, Dudhia J, Stauffer DR. 1994. A description of the fifth- generation penn state/NCAR mesoscale model (MM5). Technical report: TN-398+STR. National Center for Atmospheric Research: Boulder, CO, USA; 121 pp.
23. Hoffman RN, Kalnay E. 1983. Lagged average forecasting, an alternative to Monte Carlo forecasting. Tellus 35A: 100-118.
24. Jackson JE. 1991. A User's Guide to Principal Components. Wiley: New York.
25. Joubert AM, Hewitson BC. 1997. Simulating present and future climate changes of southern Africa using general circulation models. Progress in Physical Geography 21: 51-78.
26. Joubert AM, Katzfey JJ, McGregor JL, Nguyen KC. 1999. Simulating midsummer climate over southern Africa using a nested regional climate model. Journal of Geophysical Research 104: 19015-19025.
27. Kalnay E, Kanamitsu M, Kistler R, Collins W, Deaven D, Gandin L, Iredell M, Saha S, White G, Woollen J, Zhu Y, Chelliah M, Ebisuzaki W, Higgins W, Janowiak J, Mo KC, Ropelewski C, Wang J, Leetmaa A, Reynolds R, Jenne R, Joseph D. 1996. The NCEP/NCAR 40-year reanalysis project. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 77: 437-471.
28. Kgatuke MM, Landman WA, Beraki A, Mbedzi MP. 2008. The internal variability of the RegCM3 over South Africa. International Journal of Climatology 28: 505-520.
29. Kidson JW, Thompson CS. 1998. A comparison of statistical and model-based downscaling techniques for estimating local climate variations. Journal of Climate 11: 735-753.
30. Kiehl J, Hack J, Bonan G, Boville B, Breigleb B, Williamson D, Rasch P. 1996. Description of the NCAR community climate model (CCM3). (NCAR) Technical Report: TN-420 + STR. National Centre for Atmospheric Research: Boulder, CO, USA; 152 pp.
31. Krishnamurti TN, Kishtawal CM, Zang Z, LaRow T, Bachiochi D, Williford E, Gadgil S, Surendran S. 2000. Multimodel ensemble forecasts for weather and seasonal climate. Journal of Climate 13: 4196-4216.
32. Landman WA, Botes S, Goddard L, Shongwe M. 2005a. Assessing the predictability of extreme rainfall seasons over southern Africa. Geophysical Research Letters 32: L15809, DOI: 10.1029/2005GL023965.
33. Landman WA, Seth A, Camargo SJ. 2005b. The effect of regional climate model domain choice on the simulation of tropical cyclonelike vortices in the southwestern Indian Ocean. Journal of Climate 10: 1263-1274.
34. Landman WA, Goddard L. 2002. Statistical recalibration of GCM forecasts over southern Africa using model output statistics. Journal of Climate 15: 2038-2055.
35. Landman WA, Goddard L. 2005. Predicting southern African summer rainfall using a combination of MOS and perfect prognosis. Geophysical Research Letters 32: L15809, DOI: 10.1029/2005GL022910.
36. Landman WA, Mason SJ. 1999. Operational long-lead prediction of South African rainfall using canonical correlation analysis. International Journal of Climatology 19: 1073-1090.
37. Landman WA, Mason SJ. 2001. Forecasts of near-global sea surface temperatures using canonical correlation analysis. Journal of Climate 14: 3819-3833.
38. Landman WA, Mason SJ, Tyson PD, Tennant WJ. 2001a. Retro-active skill of multi-tiered forecasts of summer rainfall over southern Africa. International Journal of Climatology 21: 1-19.
39. Landman WA, Mason SJ, Tyson PD, Tennant WJ. 2001b. Statistical downscaling of GCM simulations to streamflow. Journal of Hydrology 252: 221-236.
40. Landman WA, Tennant WJ. 2000. Statistical downscaling of monthly forecasts. International Journal of Climatology 20: 1521-1532.
41. Leung LR, Ghan SJ. 1999. Pacific northwest climate sensitivity simulated by a regional climate model driven by a GCM. Part I: Control simulations. Journal of Climate 12: 2010-2030.
42. Mason SJ. 1995. Sea-surface temperature - South African rainfall associations, 1910-1989. International Journal of Climatology 15: 119-135.
43. Mason SJ. 1998. Seasonal forecasting of South African rainfall using a non-linear discriminant analysis model. International Journal of Climatology 18: 147-164.
44. Mason SJ, Graham NE. 2002. Areas beneath the relative operating characteristics (ROC) and relative operating levels (ROL) curves: Statistical significance and interpretation. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society 128: 2145-2166.
45. Mason SJ, Joubert AM. 1997. Simulating changes in extreme rainfall over southern Africa. International Journal of Climatology 17: 291-301.
46. Mason SJ, Jury MR. 1997. Climate variability and change over southern Africa: a reflection on underlying processes. Progress in Physical Geography 21: 23-50.
47. Murphy J. 1999. An evaluation of statistical and dynamical techniques for downscaling local climate. Journal of Climate 12: 2256-2284.
48. Palmer TN, Alessandri A, Anderson U, Cantelaube P, Davey M, Délécluse P, Déqué M, Díez E, Doblas-Reyes FJ, Feddersen H, Graham R, Gualdi S, Guérémy J-F, Hagedorn R, Hoshen M, Keenlyside N, Latif M, Lazar A, Maisonnave E, Marletto V, Morse AP, Orfila B, Rogel P, Terres J-M, Thomson MC. 2004. Development of a European multimodel ensemble system for seasonal-to-interannual prediction (DEMETER). Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 85: 853-872, DOI: 10.1175/BAMS-85-6-853.
49. Potts JM, Folland CK, Jolliffe IT, Sexton D. 1996. Revised 'LEPS' scores for assessing climate model simulations and long-range forecasts. Journal of Climate 9: 34-53.
50. Qian Jendash H, Seth A, Zebiak S. 2003. Reinitialised versus continuous simulations for regional climate downscaling. Monthly Weather Review 131: 2857-2873.
51. Reason CJC. 2001. Subtropical Indian Ocean SST dipole events and southern African rainfall. Geophysical Research Letters 28: 2225-2227.
52. Reason CJC, Keibel A. 2004. Tropical cyclone Eline and its unusual penetration and impacts over the southern African mainland. Weather and Forecasting 19: 789-805.
53. Reynolds RW, Smith TM. 1994. Improved global sea surface temperature analyses using optimum interpolation. Journal of Climate 7: 929-948.
54. Roeckner E, Arpe K, Bengtsson L, Christoph M, Claussen M, Dümenil L, Esch M, Giorgetta M, Schlese U, Schulzweida U. 1996. The atmospheric general circulation model ECHAM4: Model description and simulation of present-day climate. Report No. 218. Max-Planck- Institüt für Meteorologie: Hamburg, 90.
55. Saha S, Nadiga S, Thiaw C, Wang J, Wang W, Zhang Q, Van den Dool HM, Pan H-L, Moorthi S, Behringer D, Stokes D, Peña M, Lord S, White G, Ebisuzaki W, Peng P, Xie P. 2006. The NCEP climate forecast system. Journal of Climate 19: 3483-3517.
56. Seth A, Giorgi F. 1998. The effects of domain choice on summer precipitation simulation and sensitivity in a regional climate model. Journal of Climate 11: 2698-2712.
57. rd ACM National Conference: New York, USA; 517-524.
58. Shongwe ME, Landman WA, Mason SJ. 2006. Performance of recalibration systems of GCM forecasts for southern Africa. International Journal of Climatology 26: 1567-1585.
59. Smith TM, Reynolds RW, Livezey RE, Stokes DC. 1996. Reconstruction of historical sea surface temperatures using empirical orthogonal functions. Journal of Climate 9: 1403-1420.
60. Taylor AA, Leslie LM. 2005. A single-station approach to model output statistics temperature forecast error assessment. Weather and Forecasting 20: 1006-1020.
61. Tyson PD, Preston-Whyte RA. 2000. The Weather and Climate of Southern Africa. Oxford University Press: Cape Town.
62. Washington R, Preston A. 2006. Extreme wet years over southern Africa: Role of Indian Ocean sea surface temperatures. Journal of Geophysical Research 111: D15104, DOI: 10.1029/2005JD006724.
63. Washington R, Todd M. 1999. Tropical-temperate links in southern African and southwest Indian Ocean satellite-derived daily rainfall. International Journal of Climatology 19: 1601-1616.
64. Wilby RL, Wigley TML. 1997. Downscaling general circulation model output: a review of methods and limitations. Progress in Physical Geography 21: 530-548.
65. Wilks DS. 2006. Statistical Methods in the Atmospheric Sciences, 2nd edn. Academic Press: San Diego, CA.
66. Yeh S-W, Wu R, Kirtman BP. 2007. Impact of the Indian Ocean on ENSO variability in a hybrid coupled model. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society 133: 445-457, DOI: 10.1002/qj.18.