The Ability of Regional Climate Models to Simulate Weather Conditions on Nordenskiöldbreen, Svalbard

• Main Authors: Andersson, Malin, Erikson, Erica
• Format: Bachelor Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: Uppsala universitet, Luft-, vatten- och landskapslära 2018
• Subjects: Regional climate models; automatic weather station; glacier; Svalbard; Regionala klimatmodeller; automatisk väderstation; glaciär; Physical Geography; Naturgeografi; Nordenskiöldbreen
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-354430

In this project, we analyse the ability of two regional climate models to simulate meteorological conditions on Nordenskiöldbreen, a glacier in Svalbard. To do so, regional climate model output is compared with in situ measurements from an automatic weather station. Detailed information about the weather conditions on Nordenskiöldbreen is important for simulating the glacial mass balance in a changing climate. The parameters analysed were the following: temperature, air pressure, relative humidity, precipitation, cloud cover, wind speed and wind direction. The weather station did not measure all parameters, cloud cover was instead estimated through the incoming longwave radiation and temperature, while precipitation was calculated from snow depth. The results show that the models represent certain parameters better than others. Temperature, air pressure and wind speed and direction are found to be simulated with high precision. Poorest agreement is found for precipitation, which appears to be both difficult to simulate and observe. Relative humidity and cloud cover show average agreement with the station. The conclusion of the project is that the estimation of some of the parameters is satisfactory, while others are lacking. None of the models can be determined to have performed significantly better than the other. I det här projektet analyserades två regionala klimatmodellers förmåga att simulera meteorologiska förhållanden på Nordenskiöldbreen, en glaciär på Svalbard. Detta gjordes genom jämförelser av data från regionala klimatmodeller mot lokala mätningar från en automatisk väderstation. Detaljerad information om väderförhållandena på Nordenskiöldbreen är viktigt för att kunna simulera glaciärens massbalans i ett föränderligt klimat. Parametrarna som jämfördes var temperatur, lufttryck, relativ luftfuktighet, nederbörd, molntäcke samt vindhastighet och vindriktning. Stationen mätte inte alla parametrar, molntäcket uppskattades istället genom inkommande långvågig strålning och temperatur, medan nederbörd ...