Workshop on Spatial and temporal climate change analysis using CORDEX regional climate models over South Asia for Bangladesh

About the training

The international Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) are in collaboration with the Met Office, UK’s national meteorological agency, the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP)/COordinated Regional Climate Downscaling EXperiment (CORDEX), the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI); the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), and the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), organizing a three-day training for relevant professionals in Bangladesh on spatial and temporal analysis of climate change using CORDEX regional climate models over South Asia. Supported by the WCRP/CORDEX, this training will introduce climate change science and focus on bias calculation and selection of few representative models for a defined area of interest.

Objectives

The training aims to build knowledge and skills for analysing climate change projections using CORDEX regional climate model simulations for professionals in Bangladesh.

Expected outcomes

The training will help participants better understand climate model projections using 17 regional climate models, selecting representative models which best replicate historical climate cycles, and assessing spatial and temporal variability of present and future climate change over a defined area of interest.

In addition to gaining an overall understanding of climate modelling and downscaling, the participants will be able to:

  • Prepare CORDEX datasets in areas of interest and compare them with reference datasets
  • Visualize spatial and temporal variation in climate change projections
  • Interpret uncertainty in model results

Participation

In its current iteration, this training is being offered to professionals from the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), and relevant universities in Bangladesh.

Resource persons

ICIMOD: Santosh Nepal, Saurav Pradhananga, Kabi Raj Khatiwada, Mandira Singh Shrestha

CORDEX: Iréne Lake

Centre for Climate Change Research, IITM – Pune: J Sanjay

Background

In October 2020, ICIMOD, Met Office, WCRP/CORDEX, SMHI, and IITM – Pune organized a training on Regional climate change projections: Climate change analysis using CORDEX regional climate models over South Asia for professionals from national meteorological and hydrological services (NMHS) in ARRCC focal countries— Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Pakistan under our Climate Services Initiative. Thereafter, a country-focused training for the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology and Tribhuvan University was held in Nepal in June 2021.

The December 2021 edition will focus on using CORDEX regional climate models for spatial and temporal analysis of climate change over South Asia for professionals from Bangladesh. The training will delve into how R-based tools can be used to analyse and visualize climate change projections spatially at different time scales.

 

Podcast on CORDEX Africa

The Climate System Analysis Group (CSAG) at the University of Cape Town a while ago started a podcast called Climate Frontiers.

The third episode, guided by Dr Chris Lennard (former CORDEX SAT-member) and published in July 2021, focused on CORDEX Africa and how it has developed during the last decade.

Many African CORDEX community members, a former CORDEX co-chair, the IPOC director, and others contribute to the podcast with some of their views on building the capacity of African scientists working with climate related issues as well as the benefits for society.

Please find more information and the link to listen here.

 

You can still register for the WCRP workshop on attribution of multi-annual to decadal changes in the climate system

The WCRP workshop on attribution of multi-annual to decadal changes in the climate system will be held online 22-24 September, see more here.

German TV interviews CORDEX co-chair about the release of information sheets based on EURO-CORDEX simulations

The national German TV channel “ARD” contacted GERICS after hearing about the release of the  “Klimaausblicke” (Climate outlooks). In   the news item the reporter says that the data describing climate change in Germany has remained rather coarse in the past. This has now been changed by the publication of the analysis of climate data for each of the German counties by the Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon / GERICS.

Altogether, 401   “Klimaausblicke” (Climate outlooks) can be downloaded for free to enable counties to prepare for the future.

Daniela Jacob says German counties now have access to detailed knowledge about possible future climate change, which needs to be considered for future planning.  No-one in Germany may say in the future: I didn’t know this.

The “Klimaausblicke” are based on 85 climate simulations (from the EURO-CORDEX community). Different scenarios, which depend on future climate mitigation, have been investigated,.

As an example, climate change information for different indices are given for the city of Karlsruhe located in South-Western Germany for RCP4.5 – representing a ‘middle’ emission concentration development.

Norbert Hacker, head of environment protection and work safety   in Karlsruhe, another guest on this news item talked about the consequences of present day climate change impacts and strategies, e.g., the dying of trees due to droughts and possible measures like watering trees in the city.

To sum up, it is mentioned that the “Klimaausblicke” are based on model simulations for this century carried out in a European effort. The spread shows that future climate change could be stronger or weaker dependent on our mitigation efforts.

After the release of “Klimaausblicke”, Daniela Jacob says that mitigating climate change is essential and that it is now obvious which consequences and related costs can be avoided by mitigating climate change.

 

Links:

TV-Spot of ARD (German television): https://www.tagesschau.de/multimedia/video/video-886911.html

GERICS press release: https://gerics.de/about/news_and_events/news/102260/index.php.en

GERICS product page (German only): https://gerics.de/products_and_publications/fact_sheets/landkreise/index.php.de

Interactive map: https://interaktiv.morgenpost.de/klimawandel-hitze-starkregen-deutschland-karte/

 

 

The 42nd Session of the WCRP Joint Scientific Committee (JSC-42)

Today will be the last day of the the 42nd Session of the WCRP Joint Scientific Committee (JSC-42). It has so far been a week with interesting discussions on further scientific, coordinative and communicative development.

The aim has been to, among others, approve and  plan for the new Lighthouse Activities,  the new ‘CORE Projects’ “Earth System Modelling and Observations” and “Regional Climate Information for Society (RIfS)” and of course discuss progress and plans for the already established Core Projects, Grand Challenges and other major activities.

Daniela Jacob, co-chair of CORDEX Science Advisory Team (SAT), on behalf of the CORDEX community held a presentation on CORDEX latest achievements, upcoming activities and scientific priorities as well as CORDEX contributions to RIfS.  Please see the CORDEX report and presentation at JSC-42 for more details.

For more information on JSC-42, please visit https://www.wcrp-climate.org/jsc42-about.

We look forward to further strengthen the CORDEX community involvement and to continued and increased cooperation and exchange across WCRP activities!

Central/South America follow-up Online Paper-Writing Workshop

CORDEX Central America and South America are organizing a follow-up Online Paper-Writing Workshop on Regional Climate Modeling. The workshop will take place on May 3 and 5 at 17 UTC.

At the first online Paper Writing Workshop in November/December a number of collaboration groups consisting of students and early career researchers  were formed.  The groups choose a topic with focus on specific regional climate phenomena, outlined a work plan and time-line with the aim to submit a  paper with the scientific results. This follow-up workshop includes for instance update of status; project outline, data and methods and exchange of reviews between the groups.