Use large ensembles to quantify the limitations of using short observational sea ice timeseries

Alexandra Jahn, CU Boulder, USA

The scientific questions that will be studied:

How can we use short observational sea ice timeseries, such as ice thickness from satellites, for model evaluation, while accounting for internal variability?

The type of analyses that will be conducted



In order to address this question, we will use large ensemble simulations to study the variability and trends in model simulations of sea ice variables, with a focus of sea ice thickness. In particular, we will study the internal variability over different periods, de-correlation timescales, and the trends in sea ice thickness and volume from various large ensemble simulations to establish within which margins these simulated and observed sea ice fields should agree given their short coverage period. That will allow us to make use of these important but short timeseries to evaluate sea ice simulations and identify biases, but avoid spurious bias detection from internal variability.

Update:
•    Analysis of CESM LE sea ice thickness compared to observations in progress (Jahn, Dochen, Hall, in preparation)