Overview of the Pacific Northwest Environmental Prediction System

Supported by the Northwest Modeling Consortium…the regional modeling effort centered at the UW is Running the MM5 at 36, 12, and 4 km resolution Running the new WRF model at 36, 12 km and 4 km resolution Running TWO high resolution regional ensemble systems to provide probabilistic forecasts and data assimilation Gathering all local weather observations from dozens of networks. Plus quality control. Running a wide range of weather applications dealing with air quality, hydrology, transportation weather and fire weather.

36 km

12 km

4 km

NWNet: Regional Real-Time Collection of Over 60 Networks Over the Pacific Northwest

The UW Quality Control System A major task continues to be the gathering of all real-time observations of the region into one place Right now we acquire over 60 networks in real time for displaying on our web site, verification, and many other uses Quality Control is essential for such a heterogeneous network of networks.

The UW Quality Control and Warning System We have developed an advanced QC system suitable for an area of complex terrain Have also created an automated QC display system that one can check on the web and which can automatically tell the manager of a network when their data is suspect

The effort has roughly three clusters of Linux machines and 120 TB of storage

The “Audience” for NW MM5 Products Continues to Increase

The UW Ensemble System The UW ensemble system was borne out of experience from the high-resolution local MM5 effort ( km resolution) Specifically, although high resolution in general produced better (sharper, high amplitude) structures, the forecasts verified only marginally better than lower resolution forecasts using traditional measures. UW research on forecast verification and evaluation revealed large differences, and thus uncertainty, in the initializations and forecasts of major operational forecasting systems. Also apparent that there is considerable uncertainty in the model physical parameterizations.

Previous results showed that approximately 12-km resolution was needed to get the major regional mesoscale features “right.” Thus, it was natural to create a 12-km mesoscale ensemble system for the Northwest. UW Ensemble System

UW Mesoscale Ensemble System Single limited-area mesoscale modeling system (MM5) 2-day (48-hr) forecasts at 0000 UTC in real-time since January New 12 UTC cycle 36 and 12-km domains. Configurations of the MM5 short-range ensemble grid domains. (a) Outer 151  127 domain with 36-km horizontal grid spacing. (b) Inner 103  100 domain with 12-km horizontal grid spacing. a)b) 36-km 12-km

UW Ensemble System UW system is based on the use of analyses and forecasts of major operational modeling centers. The idea is that differences in initial conditions of various operational centers is a measure of IC uncertainty. These IC differences reflect different data inventories, assimilation schemes, and model physics/numerics and can be quite large, often much greater than observation errors. In this approach each ensemble member uses different boundary conditions--thus finessing the problem of the BC restraining ensemble spread.

Resolution ( 45  N ) Objective Abbreviation/Model/Source Type Computational Distributed Analysis avn, Global Forecast System (GFS), SpectralT254 / L641.0  / L14 SSI National Centers for Environmental Prediction~55 km~80 km3D Var cmcg, Global Environmental Multi-scale (GEM), Finite0.9  0.9  /L  / L113D Var Canadian Meteorological Centre Diff ~70 km ~100 km eta, limited-area mesoscale model, Finite32 km / L45 90 km / L37SSI National Centers for Environmental Prediction Diff.3D Var gasp, Global AnalysiS and Prediction model,SpectralT239 / L291.0  / L11 3D Var Australian Bureau of Meteorology~60 km~80 km jma, Global Spectral Model (GSM),SpectralT106 / L  / L13OI Japan Meteorological Agency~135 km~100 km ngps, Navy Operational Global Atmos. Pred. System,SpectralT239 / L301.0  / L14OI Fleet Numerical Meteorological & Oceanographic Cntr. ~60 km~80 km tcwb, Global Forecast System,SpectralT79 / L181.0  / L11 OI Taiwan Central Weather Bureau~180 km~80 km ukmo, Unified Model, Finite5/6  5/9  /L30same / L123D Var United Kingdom Meteorological Office Diff.~60 km “Native” Models/Analyses Available

Relating Forecast Skill and Model Spread Mean Absolute Error of Wind Direction is Far Less When Spread is EXTREME (Low or High)

Ensemble-Based Probabilistic Products

Local Data Assimilation using an EnKF System The system produces 90 different analyses that can be combined to produce the best guess at what is there and tell us the uncertainty in the analyses. These analyses can be integrated forward in time to give us probabilistic predictions of the future We now have it running at 36 and 12 km resolution…

A Vision of an Integrated Regional Prediction System Output from the UW MM5 is now being fed into a number of modeling and diagnostic systems: Distributed Hydrological Model for Western Washington Calgrid Air Quality Model Land Surface Model for Surface Temperature Prediction Smoke, Ventilation, and Fire Guidance Transportation Information System

The UW Coupled MM5- DHSVM Hydrological Prediction System

Terrain meter aggregated from 30 meter resolution DEM Land Cover - 19 classes aggregated from over 200 GAP classes Soils - 3 layers aggregated from 13 layers (31 different classes); variable soil depth from 1-3 meters Stream Network - based on 0.25 km 2 source area DHSVM: Distributed Hydrology Soil Vegetation Model

DHSVM

DHSVM Distributed Hydrological Prediction System

11/25 12/01 12/07 12/13 12/19 December 11-12, 2001 Santium River

The UW/Washington State University Coupled MM5-Air Quality Prediction System

AIRPACT Regional Air Quality Modeling System MM5CALMETCALGRID u, v formatted for each layer of CALMET u, v formatted for each layer of CALMET 3D met field: u, v, w, T, BL variables 3D met field: u, v, w, T, BL variables 3D species field: O3, VOC, NOx, primary PM 3D species field: O3, VOC, NOx, primary PM IC/BC landuse terrain landuse terrain IC/BC emissions chem mech dry dep p

Calgrid Air Quality Prediction System

AIRPACT Current Developments Expand domain Add air toxics Improve PM emissions inventory –woodstoves & other primary PM sources Improve web graphics and GIS content Long term: convert to CMAQ

AIRPACT Output Products

Road Weather Information System This effort is a partnership between the UW and the Washington State Department in Transportation, with funding from the US Department of Transportation. An attempt to combine weather data, modeling, road information, and other data sources into applications that can serve the public and the Washington State DOT. Rick Steed will provide a detailed briefing.

Washington State DOT Traveler Information System

U.S. Forest Service Smoke and Fire Management System

Ventilation Index

U.S. Forest Service MM5 grids are sent to the field for running Eulerian and Lagrangian smoke plume/dispersion models. MM5 output used for fire fighting operations.

Simulating Wildland Fire in Real-Time ( Susan O’Neill, Sue Ferguson USDA Forest Service Rob Wilson US EPA BlueSky

Real-time Smoke Concentration Predictions: Prescribed, Wild, Agricultural Fires Daily Emission Tracking from Multi- Agency Burn Reporting Systems Quantitative Verification Automated, centralized processing –Forecasts for 5 domains daily Web-access output productsBlueSky What is it? Smoke Modeling Framework

Area Burned Fuel Moisture Fuel Loadings Fire Location Fire Ignition Time FIRE Characteristics Emissions Calculate fuel consumption and variable rate emissions of: Heat Released, PM2.5, PM10, PM, CO, CO2, and CH4 Meteorology 3-d Wind/Temp/Moisture UW MM5 Forecast System 12 km Domain 72 Hour Forecast Smoke Dispersion Visibility Chemistry PM Concentrations Plume Rise Web Display of Output Products (RAINS) Animations, Zoom In/Out, Concentration Fields, Trajectories, Meteorological data, Overlay GIS Data BlueSky Smoke Modeling Framework EPM/COMSUME v1.02 BURNUP CALPUFF HYSPLIT (CMAQ)

BlueSkyRAINS Output Products

BlueSkyRAINS Output

Military Applications The NW MM5 is now the main source of regional forecasts for Navy and Air Force operations at Whidbey NAS and McChord Air Force Base, as well as the Everett Carrier homeport.

The End