A Further Investigation of the Simulation of North Atlantic Storm Track Activity in CMIP5 Models

Yu, K.; Yu, P.L.; Chen, Y.G.; Lu, Y., and Hao, W., 2020. A further investigation of the simulation of North Atlantic storm track activity in CMIP5 models. In: Zheng, C.W.; Wang, Q.; Zhan, C., and Yang, S.B. (eds.), Air-Sea Interaction and Coastal Environments of the Maritime and Polar Silk Roads.Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 99, pp. 428-434. By using the historical operation data of 12 Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 (CMIP5) model and NCEP reanalysis, the current study further evaluated the capacity of these models to simulate the climatology, seasonal variation and long-term trends of North Atlantic storm track (NAST) activity. It is found that all 12 models can effectively simulate the spatial pattern of NAST activity climatology but underestimate its intensity. The multimodel ensemble (MME) mean is better than any single model at reproducing NAST activity climatology. The differences in NAST activity climatology observed between the models are primarily concentrated in a region of 50°–60°N, 40°–20°W. These CMIP5 models basically capture the seasonal variation in the NAST intensity and latitudinal position but are relatively less effective at simulating the seasonal longitudinal migration of the NAST. Additionally, obvious discrepancies in long-term trend variations in the NAST strength and position are observed between most of the models and the NCEP reanalysis results. Only two models, CanESM2 and FGOALS-g2 (FGOALS-s2 and MRI-CGCM), are reasonably effective at simulating the long-term trend of NAST strengthening (northward-moving).