Adapting a weather forecast model for greenhouse gas simulation

Abstract:

The ability to simulate greenhouse gases on the global domain is useful for providing boundary conditions for regional flux inversions, as well as for providing reference data for bias correction of satellite measurements. Given the existence of operational weather and environmental prediction models and assimilation systems at Environment Canada, it makes sense to use these tools for greenhouse gas simulations. In this work, we describe the adaptations needed to reasonably simulate CO2 with a weather forecast model. The main challenges were the implementation of a mass conserving advection scheme, and the careful implementation of a mixing ratio defined with respect to dry air. The transport of tracers through convection was also added, and the vertical mixing through the boundary layer was slightly modified. With all these changes, the model conserves CO2 mass well on the annual time scale, and the high resolution (0.9 degree grid spacing) permits a good description of synoptic scale transport. The use of a coupled meteorological/tracer transport model also permits an assessment of approximations needed in offline transport model approaches, such as the neglect of water vapour mass when computing a tracer mixing ratio with respect to dry air.