Evaluation of surface wind over the seas around the Korean Peninsula simulated by CMIP5 global and CORDEX regional climate models

Abstract

Surface wind is a major climate variable that gives an influence on ocean wave and coastal erosion. Thus, to project a future change in coastal region due to climate change, it is necessary to have a detailed information on a future changein surface wind. As a tool for a future projection of climate, global climate models have been widely used, but their spatial resolution is too coarse to give detailed information on a regional or local scale. To provide the information onfuture climate change with more details, regional climate models with high resolution have been developed for various regions with receiving growing attention. In this study, we examine the resolution effects on surface wind simulations focusing on the coastal areas surrounding the Korean Peninsula by comparing the CMIP5 (fifth phase of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project) global model outputs with the CORDEX-EA (Cordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment for East Asia) regional model outputs. Evaluation and comparison on the surface winds simulated by the global and regional models have been conducted based on global reanalyses datasets and KMA(Korea Meteorological Administration)’s in-situ observational data. The CORDEX regional models appeared to simulate the strong winds over coastal areas of the East Seawhile the CMIP5 global models were incapable to simulate the strong coastal winds mainly due to their coarse resolutions. In oun surface wind. As a tool for a future projection of climate, global climate models have been widely used, but their spatial resolution is too coarse to give detailed information on a regional or local scale. To provide the information onfuture climate change with more details, regional climate models with high resolution have been developed for various regions with receiving growing attention. In this study, we examine the resolution effects on surface wind simulations focusing on the coastal areas surrounding the Korean Peninsula by comparing the CMIP5 (fifth phase of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project) global model outputs with the CORDEX-EA (Cordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment for East Asia) regional model outputs. Evaluation and comparison on the surface winds simulated by the global and regional models have been conducted based on global reanalyses datasets and KMA(Korea Meteorological Administration)’s in-situ observational data. The CORDEX regional models appeared to simulate the strong winds over coastal areas of the East Seawhile the CMIP5 global models were incapable to simulate the strong coastal winds mainly due to their coarse resolutions. In ou