Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models
Skillful sea ice drift forecasts are crucial for scientific mission planning and marine safety. Wind is the dominant driver of ice motion variability, but more slowly varying components of the climate system, in particular ice thickness and ocean currents, bear the potential to render ice drift more...
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2022
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:dc7ef4d6361b4d63819bc240e0cbc985 2023-05-15T14:55:50+02:00 Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models S. F. Reifenberg H. F. Goessling 2022-07-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2927-2022 https://doaj.org/article/dc7ef4d6361b4d63819bc240e0cbc985 EN eng Copernicus Publications https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2927/2022/tc-16-2927-2022.pdf https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0416 https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0424 doi:10.5194/tc-16-2927-2022 1994-0416 1994-0424 https://doaj.org/article/dc7ef4d6361b4d63819bc240e0cbc985 The Cryosphere, Vol 16, Pp 2927-2946 (2022) Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 article 2022 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2927-2022 2022-12-30T23:17:08Z Skillful sea ice drift forecasts are crucial for scientific mission planning and marine safety. Wind is the dominant driver of ice motion variability, but more slowly varying components of the climate system, in particular ice thickness and ocean currents, bear the potential to render ice drift more predictable than the wind. In this study, we provide the first assessment of Arctic sea ice drift predictability in four coupled general circulation models (GCMs), using a suite of “perfect-model” ensemble simulations. We find the position vector from Lagrangian trajectories of virtual buoys to remain predictable for at least a 90 ( 45 ) d lead time for initializations in January (July), reaching about 80 % of the position uncertainty of a climatological reference forecast. In contrast, the uncertainty in Eulerian drift vector predictions reaches the level of the climatological uncertainty within 4 weeks. Spatial patterns of uncertainty, varying with season and across models, develop in all investigated GCMs. For two models providing near-surface wind data (AWI-CM1 and HadGEM1.2), we find spatial patterns and large fractions of the variance to be explained by wind vector uncertainty. The latter implies that sea ice drift is only marginally more predictable than wind. Nevertheless, particularly one of the four models (GFDL-CM3) shows a significant correlation of up to −0.85 between initial ice thickness and target position uncertainty in large parts of the Arctic. Our results provide a first assessment of the inherent predictability of ice motion in coupled climate models; they can be used to put current real-world forecast skill into perspective and highlight the model diversity of sea ice drift predictability. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Sea ice The Cryosphere Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Arctic The Cryosphere 16 7 2927 2946 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
op_collection_id |
ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 |
spellingShingle |
Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 S. F. Reifenberg H. F. Goessling Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
topic_facet |
Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 |
description |
Skillful sea ice drift forecasts are crucial for scientific mission planning and marine safety. Wind is the dominant driver of ice motion variability, but more slowly varying components of the climate system, in particular ice thickness and ocean currents, bear the potential to render ice drift more predictable than the wind. In this study, we provide the first assessment of Arctic sea ice drift predictability in four coupled general circulation models (GCMs), using a suite of “perfect-model” ensemble simulations. We find the position vector from Lagrangian trajectories of virtual buoys to remain predictable for at least a 90 ( 45 ) d lead time for initializations in January (July), reaching about 80 % of the position uncertainty of a climatological reference forecast. In contrast, the uncertainty in Eulerian drift vector predictions reaches the level of the climatological uncertainty within 4 weeks. Spatial patterns of uncertainty, varying with season and across models, develop in all investigated GCMs. For two models providing near-surface wind data (AWI-CM1 and HadGEM1.2), we find spatial patterns and large fractions of the variance to be explained by wind vector uncertainty. The latter implies that sea ice drift is only marginally more predictable than wind. Nevertheless, particularly one of the four models (GFDL-CM3) shows a significant correlation of up to −0.85 between initial ice thickness and target position uncertainty in large parts of the Arctic. Our results provide a first assessment of the inherent predictability of ice motion in coupled climate models; they can be used to put current real-world forecast skill into perspective and highlight the model diversity of sea ice drift predictability. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
S. F. Reifenberg H. F. Goessling |
author_facet |
S. F. Reifenberg H. F. Goessling |
author_sort |
S. F. Reifenberg |
title |
Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
title_short |
Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
title_full |
Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
title_fullStr |
Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
title_full_unstemmed |
Predictability of Arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
title_sort |
predictability of arctic sea ice drift in coupled climate models |
publisher |
Copernicus Publications |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2927-2022 https://doaj.org/article/dc7ef4d6361b4d63819bc240e0cbc985 |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Sea ice The Cryosphere |
genre_facet |
Arctic Sea ice The Cryosphere |
op_source |
The Cryosphere, Vol 16, Pp 2927-2946 (2022) |
op_relation |
https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2927/2022/tc-16-2927-2022.pdf https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0416 https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0424 doi:10.5194/tc-16-2927-2022 1994-0416 1994-0424 https://doaj.org/article/dc7ef4d6361b4d63819bc240e0cbc985 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2927-2022 |
container_title |
The Cryosphere |
container_volume |
16 |
container_issue |
7 |
container_start_page |
2927 |
op_container_end_page |
2946 |
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1766327837733683200 |