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Better Uderstanding the Stratosphere-Troposphere Relationship

ESRL and CIRES to Host DynVar 2 Workshop

October 25, 2010

There is increasing evidence that the stratosphere, and how it interacts with the troposphere, has the potential to alter patterns of surface climate variability and change. A better understanding of the stratosphere-troposphere relationship could lead to improved predictions of monthly and seasonal weather, and the climatic effects of greenhouse gas increases, stratospheric ozone depletion, solar changes and volcanoes. To this end, ESRL's Physical Sciences Laboratory and the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado will host scientists from around the world at the second Dynamics and Variability (DynVar) of the Stratosphere-Troposphere System (DynVar 2) Workshop, 3-5 November 2010, in Boulder, Colorado.

The workshop will provide a forum for discussing advancements in key scientific areas on the influence of the stratosphere on the global climate system. Participants will plan how best to include stratospheric processes in Climate and Earth System Models. They will also coordinate analysis of the new Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) model experiments and the Stratosphere-resolving Historical Forecast experiments, a project of the World Climate Research Programme (WRCP).

DynVar is an international climate modelling activity, which is part of the Stratospheric Process and their Role in Climate (SPARC) Project; a core project of the World Climate Research Program (WCRP). A recent Assessment of Intraseasonal to Interannual (ISI) Climate Prediction and Predictability (National Research Council, 2010) recommended that operational ISI prediction models should be improved to represent stratosphere-troposphere interactions. Scientists from modeling centers and universities around the world are using general circulation models to better understand how the stratosphere: 1) affects average climate in the troposphere, 2) impacts climate variability on all timescales, and 3) impacts climate change.

The DynVAR 2 workshop is sponsored by NOAA Modeling, Analysis, Prediction and Projection (MAPP) Program, SPARC, and the European integrating project COMBINE (Comprehensive Modelling of the Earth System for Better Climate Prediction and Projection).