One-dimensional and spatially distributed simulations of the effect of snow on mass balance and flooding of Antarctic sea ice

• Main Author: Wever, Nander
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Zenodo 2021
• Subjects: Sea ice; Numerical simulations; Snow; Antarctic; Weddell Sea; Austral; Weddell; Merra; Wever; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4717808; https://zenodo.org/record/4717808

SNOWPACK and Alpine3D model simulations of the snow-sea ice system for two sea ice floes in the Weddell Sea, Antarctica, which were visited in austral winter 2013 by Research Vessel Polarstern during the AWECS campaign. MeteoIO (required for preparing the meteorological data for SNOWPACK and Alpine3D), SNOWPACK and Alpine3D is software published under a GNU LGPLv3 license by the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF at https://gitlabext.wsl.ch/snow-models. The repository used to develop the model code used in the study can be accessed via DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4560829. The exact model source code to reproduce/run the simulations in this repository can be accessed via DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4708266. This dataset belongs to: Wever, N., Leonard, K., Maksym, T., White, S., Proksch, M., and Lenaerts, J. T. M. (2021) Spatially distributed simulations of the effect of snow on mass balance and flooding of Antarctic sea ice. J. of Glaciology, doi: 10.1017/jog.2021.54. Summary: ====== Simulations were run for two sea ice floes: PS81/506 and PS81/517. Meteorological driving data is provided by the MERRA-2 reanalysis. Initial conditions were chosen based on available measurements of snow and ice thickness. This dataset consists of the following files: snowpack_sim_506.zip: archive containing one-dimensional simulations using the SNOWPACK model for sea ice floe PS81/506. snowpack_sim_517.zip: archive containing one-dimensional simulations using the SNOWPACK model for sea ice floe PS81/517. a3d_sim_506.zip: archive containing spatially distributed simulations using the Alpine3D model for sea ice floe PS81/506. a3d_sim_517.zip: archive containing spatially distributed simulations using the Alpine3D model for sea ice floe PS81/517. Description of files: ============ The snowpack_sim_5XX.zip files are organized as follows: io_base.ini: configuration file embedded from other configuration files with the settings shared among both SNOWPACK as well as alpine3d simulations. io_PS81-AVG5XX.ini: configuration file for SNOWPACK, using floe-averaged snow and ice thickness from observations. The settings use sea level as reference, such that 5 m height in the output corresponds to sea level. io_PS81-AVG5XX_marked.ini: as io_PS81-AVG5XX.ini, but the 5 m height in the output corresponds to the snow/sea ice interface determined upon initialization io_PS81-IMB5XX.ini: configuration file for SNOWPACK, using snow and ice thickness determined at the Ice Mass Balance (IMB) buoy site. The settings use sea level as reference, such that 5 m height in the output corresponds to sea level. io_PS81-IMB5XX_marked.ini: as io_PS81-IMB5XX.ini, but the 5 m height in the output corresponds to the snow/sea ice interface determined upon installation of the buoy. For PS81/517, configuration files io_PS81-IMB517_OHF.ini and io_PS81-IMB517_OHF_marked.ini define simulations with a reduced ocean heat flux of 2 W m-2. ./input/: this folder contains the input files, consisting of the initial snow and ice conditions (*.sno files), and meteorological time series used to drive the simulations (*.smet files). The files labeled "_marked" have marked the snow/sea ice interface using the column "mk", with a value >= 9000. ./output/: this folder contains the output files, consisting of a *smet file for the time series of output variables, *pro files for full snow and ice layering information, *ini files containing the settings used in the simulations, *sno files containing the output snow and ice layering, and *haz files which are written by default by SNOWPACK. Output *smet and *pro files can be visualized using NiViz. The a3d_sim_5XX.zip files are organized as follows: ./bin/: The run.sh script in ./setup/ assumes the alpine3d binary is located here. After compiling MeteoIO, SNOWPACK and alpine3d, copy the libraries and binaries in this folder before executing run.sh. ./input/meteo/: this folder contains the meteorological time series used to drive the simulations (*.smet files). For PS81/506 and PS81/517, the forcing data is in WHOI05.smet and WHOI01.smet, respectively. The files are named by the IMB buoy they belong to, since the coordinates of the buoy was used to derive the forcing data from the closest MERRA-2 grid point. ./input/snowfiles/: this folder contains the initial conditions files containing initial snow and sea ice layers, for each pixel in the alpine3d model domain. ./input/surface-grids/: this folder contains the initial digital elevation model (it contains only zeros, but defines the grid), a land use map (required by alpine3d) and a list of points of interest for which the full snow profile is stored. ./output/grids/: this folder contains gridded model output. In this case it is elevation (ELEV) above sea level, and precipitation (PSUM). ./output/meteo/: this folder contains the full snow and sea ice layering information in *pro files and time series in *smet files for each model grid point. ./output/snowfiles/: this folder can be used to store output *sno files, but is currently empty. ./setup/io.ini: configuration file for the specific alpine3d simulation ./setup/io_base.ini: configuration file shared with all simulations (including the one-dimensional SNOWPACK simulations). This file is embedded by io_base_a3d.ini. ./setup/io_base_a3d.ini: configuration file shared with other a3d simulations. This file is embedded by io.ini. ./setup/run.sh: run script for the alpine3d simulation Notes: ==== Compiling SNOWPACK with LAPACK and BLAS libraries is required for reproducing the simulations (see cmake option).