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Ice and Climate Newsletter
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ISSN 1811-0843 |
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In this issue: |
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Our November 2019 newsletter includes a science feature on the initMIP-Antarctica paper focusing on an ice sheet model initialization experiment of ISMIP6 and summaries of various CliC events held over the summer and the fall as well as a list of our upcoming workshops and meetings. CliC will hold the 15th Session of its Scientific Steering Group on December 14-15, 2019, in San Francisco, in conjunction with the 2019 AGU Fall Meeting and the 40th Anniversary of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP). For more information follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook! |
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Science Feature |
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initMIP-Antarctica: an ice sheet model initialization experiment of ISMIP6--ISMIP6 is a CliC Targeted Activity and part of the WCRP Grand Challenge on Melting Ice and Global Consequences https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-13-1441-2019, 2019.![]() Citation: Seroussi, H., Nowicki, S., Simon, E., Abe-Ouchi, A., Albrecht, T., Brondex, J., Cornford, S., Dumas, C., Gillet-Chaulet, F., Goelzer, H., Golledge, N. R., Gregory, J. M., Greve, R., Hoffman, M. J., Humbert, A., Huybrechts, P., Kleiner, T., Larour, E., Leguy, G., Lipscomb, W. H., Lowry, D., Mengel, M., Morlighem, M., Pattyn, F., Payne, A. J., Pollard, D., Price, S. F., Quiquet, A., Reerink, T. J., Reese, R., Rodehacke, C. B., Schlegel, N.-J., Shepherd, A., Sun, S., Sutter, J., Van Breedam, J., van de Wal, R. S. W., Winkelmann, R., and Zhang, T.: initMIP-Antarctica: an ice sheet model initialization experiment of ISMIP6, The Cryosphere, 13, 1441–1471, Ice sheet numerical modeling is an important tool to estimate the dynamic contribution of the Antarctic ice sheet to sea level rise over the coming centuries. The influence of initial conditions on ice sheet model simulations, however, is still unclear. To better understand this influence, an initial state intercomparison exercise (initMIP) has been developed to compare, evaluate, and improve initialization procedures and estimate their impact on century-scale simulations. initMIP is the first set of experiments of the Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project for CMIP6 (ISMIP6), which is the primary Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) activity focusing on the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. Following initMIP-Greenland, initMIP-Antarctica has been designed to explore uncertainties associated with model initialization and spin-up and to evaluate the impact of changes in external forcings. Starting from the state of the Antarctic ice sheet at the end of the initialization procedure, three forward experiments are each run for 100 years: a control run, a run with a surface mass balance anomaly, and a run with a basal melting anomaly beneath floating ice. This study presents the results of initMIP-Antarctica from 25 simulations performed by 16 international modeling groups. The submitted results use different initial conditions and initialization methods, as well as ice flow model parameters and reference external forcings. We find a good agreement among model responses to the surface mass balance anomaly but large variations in responses to the basal melting anomaly. These variations can be attributed to differences in the extent of ice shelves and their upstream tributaries, the numerical treatment of grounding line, and the initial ocean conditions applied, suggesting that ongoing efforts to better represent ice shelves in continental-scale models should continue.This paper is part of the ISMIP6 Special Issue in the EGU journal The Cryosphere. |
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CliC News |
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Polar Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment (CORDEX) Annual meeting, October 7-9, 2019, Copenhagen, Denmark--Contributed by Annette Rinke, John Cassano, and Andrew Orr CliC representation at OceanObs'19, September 16-20, 2019, HI, USACliC funded two representatives from the CLIVAR/CliC/SCAR Southern Ocean Region Panel, Robin Robertson and Ronald Buss de Souza, to participate in the OceanObs'19 Conference in Hawaii in September. They share their experience below.![]() 'OceanObs'19 was a great forum to meet, interact and make plans for future collaborations with colleagues from all around the globe. I was particularly interested in learning more about how my international partners are collaborating in order to expand their observational efforts in the fields of marine meteorology and air-sea interaction. When at the conference, as well as attending the conference sessions, I had the privilege of presenting a poster authored by Dr. Sebastiaan Swart and collaborators resuming the Southern Ocean Observing System, Air-Sea Fluxes Task Group's more recent efforts. The paper, entitled "Constraining Southern Ocean Air-Sea-Ice Fluxes Through Enhanced Observations" (Front. Mar. Sci. 6:421, doi: 10.3389/fmars.2019.00421), suggests that we should build up a Southern Ocean observing system to produce air-sea-ice flux data aiming to provide continuous measurements and diminish uncertanties in our flux estimates.' Robin Robertson, Xiamen University, Malaysia: Despite this, I had an extremely productive meeting. Probably the most applicable development for the general Southern Ocean and Antarctic community was the priority to fill in the gaps in the existing data coverage. They mentioned the ocean east of Africa, but the Southern Ocean and the Antarctic are big gaps, especially spatially in the coastal regions and/or ice covered areas and temporally during spring and winter. And there was significant information about the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development and the ocean research being carried out in China. I found the breakout sessions more productive than the plenaries and panel discussions, which tended to be a bit vague. There is a lot of movement on data availability and end user engagement. Integrating with the modelers was a priority, which as a modeler who does observations was of great encouragement to me. So despite the first paragraph, I had a very productive meeting in many different aspects: saw new instruments and vehicles for instrument deployment, talked to Jules Hummon about ADCP processing, attended several Early Career Functions as a mentor, had several discussions about future collaborations, etc.' CliC Co-sponsor of the International Glaciological Society’s Sea ice Symposium, August 19-23, 2019, Winnipeg, CanadaCliC co-sponsored the IGS Sea Ice Symposium held in Winnipeg in August and provided funding for 3 workshops organized in conjunction with the Symposium (see below). The IGS co-hosts a sea ice symposium every 5 years. The Centre for Earth Observation Science (University of Manitoba) hosted the first IGS event held in Canada. The symposium included oral and poster sessions, and provided a friendly and intellectually stimulating environment to facilitate face-to-face interactions and networking. Sea ice plays a critically important yet highly dynamic role in global climate, polar marine ecosystems, globalization, and Indigenous cultures. The theme of this event focused on the implications that changes to sea icescapes and freshwater-marine coupling particularly involving ice sheets, glaciers, ice shelves, sea ice loss and continental runoff have on climate systems within and beyond polar regions, environmental and ecological integrity, and socioeconomic development at the regional to global scales. For more information visit the IGS Sea Ice Symposium website. Biogeochemical Exchange Processes at the Sea Ice Interfaces (BEPSII) Meeting in conjunction with the International Glaciological Society’s Sea ice Symposium, August 16-18, 2019, Winnipeg, Canada--Contributed by Martin Vancoppenolle The workshop spanned three days, split into activities related to each of the five BEPSII’s task groups, including (i) the SCOR working group ECV-ICE focused on methodologies, (ii) technology & data collation, (iii) modelling & observational process studies, (iv) synthesis and (v) outreach. Highlights of this year include inter-comparison field & lab experiments in Japan and UK focused on ice optics and gases; the development of a new eddy-covariance technique to measure CO2 fluxes over sea ice (Butterworth and Else, Atmos Meas. Tech. 2019); finalization of a synthesis paper dedicated to outline the impacts of upcoming sea ice changes on biogeochemistry and ecosystems; discussions around a possible sea ice ecosystem services synthesis; and progresses around two model inter-comparison exercises. Perspectives for BEPSII were also discussed. Key items included plans for an upcoming field school (possibly scheduled for 2021 in Cambridge Bay, Canada), plans for a specific BEPSII cruise, the involvement of early-career scientists, and revision of our 5-year plan. Next meeting will be held in Hobart, summer 2020, next to the SCAR open science conference. Antarctic Sea-ice Processes and Climate (ASPeCt) Meeting in conjunction with the International Glaciological Society’s Sea ice Symposium, August 18, 2019, Winnipeg, Canada--Contributed by Marilyn Raphael
Sea Ice Modeling Intercomparison Project (SIMIP) Meeting in conjunction with the International Glaciological Society’s Sea ice Symposium, August 18, 2019, Winnipeg, Canada--Contributed by Alexandra Jahn and Dirk Notz
The workshop was designed as a mix of short research presentations and updates from targeted analysis groups established at the last SIMIP workshop and discussions. We started with a welcome and an update on SIMIP by the SIMIP chairs, Alexandra Jahn and Dirk Notz, including the sea ice CMIP6 data currently available on the CMIP6 archives and the deadline for paper submissions and acceptance for inclusion in the next IPCC report (December 31st 2019 and September 30th 2020, respectively). Dirk Notz then updated everyone on the plans for a SIMIP community paper, which has the goal to summarize the overall sea ice state in CMIP6 and the change to CMIP5, authored by the SIMIP community. It has the goal to establish how sea ice loss is represented in CMIP6, so that individual scientists can focus on the more interesting in-depth and process-based analysis. This update was followed by discussions on the SIMIP paper, in terms of what kind of analysis should be included. This was followed by 4 short presentations on new CMIP5/CMIP6 results, which were well received and represented some of the first CMIP6 sea ice analysis shared. The activity leads from the targeted analysis efforts established at the 2017 SIMIP workshop then were invited to present updates on progress and plans under their activities. We had 10 groups provide updates, either in person or by sending slides or written updates, and all had very interesting results and plans to share, which sparked many discussions. After a short break, we then heard short presentations on new observational data sets that can be used for climate model evaluation, in particular focused on ice thickness datasets. This was followed by a discussion to revise the SIMIP community paper, to solicit further feedback after all the updates and some of the new CMIP6 results were shared. The workshop was followed by a no-host lunch at a local place, attended by 12 participants, providing an opportunity to continue conversations. Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project for CMIP6 (ISMIP6) Meeting in conjunction with the 27th International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics General Assembly, July 14, 2019, Montreal, Canada--Contributed by Sophie Nowicki
As ISMIP6 reaches its final stage, topics that were presented and discussed include: A review of the ISMIP6 effort and what we are learned from our first set of experiments of ice sheet model initialization (initMIP efforts). A review of the CMIP5 climate model selections, and how changes in the atmosphere and ocean characteristics translate into atmospheric and oceanic forcing for standalone ice sheet models. Initial submissions to the suite of core ISMIP6 projections for the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets were presented and guided the discussion the next suite of experiments (targeted) for standalone ice sheet models. Simulations from CMIP6 coupled ice sheet-climate models (CESM and UKESM) were also presented. The next phase of ISMIP6 was discussed, which included topics such as how to include simulation with CMIP6 climate models as these become available, as well as publication strategy. Glacier Modelling Intercomparison Project (GlacierMIP) Meeting in conjunction with the 27th International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics General Assembly, July 13, 2019, Montreal, Canada--Contributed by Ben Marzeion Polar Climate Predictability Initiative Meeting in conjunction with the 27th International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics General Assembly, July 11, 2019, Montreal, Canada--Contributed by Julie JonesThis meeting was the second of two held this year to allow new PCPI members to meet face to face with long-term members. In this case new member Alex Jahn met with Julie Jones and Gareth Marshall. The meeting of subsets of its members at scientific meetings is part of the strategy employed by PCPI to supplement online meetings. We had a productive meeting discussing ideas for future PCPI activities and development. This meeting built on the first one held in Cambridge in June 2019. CliC provided the PCPI with funds to support the attendance of Alex (an ECR) which enabled her participation in the IAMAS symposium at the IUGG, where she co-convened a session (Past and Future Changes in Polar Climate System and their Global Linkages), and presented in the session ‘Atmosphere-Ocean-Sea Ice Interactions: Local Processes and Global Implications’. Julie (who also received CliC support) and Gareth also presented, and all three benefited from attending many PCPI relevant sessions/presentations. |
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Upcoming CliC Events |
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9th Permafrost Carbon Network Annual Meeting in conjunction with AGU |
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Sponsor![]() |
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CliC International Project Office
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