Search Results
A generic pixel-to-point comparison for simulated large-scale ecosystem properties and ground-based observations: An example from the Amazon region
2018, Rammig, Anja, Heinke, Jens, Hofhansl, Florian, Verbeeck, Hans, Baker, Timothy R., Christoffersen, Bradley, Ciais, Philippe, De Deurwaerder, Hannes, Fleischer, Katrin, Galbraith, David, Guimberteau, Matthieu, Huth, Andreas, Johnson, Michelle, Krujit, Bart, Langerwisch, Fanny, Meir, Patrick, Papastefanou, Phillip, Sampaio, Gilvan, Thonicke, Kirsten, von Randow, Celso, Zang, Christian, Rödig, Edna
Comparing model output and observed data is an important step for assessing model performance and quality of simulation results. However, such comparisons are often hampered by differences in spatial scales between local point observations and large-scale simulations of grid cells or pixels. In this study, we propose a generic approach for a pixel-to-point comparison and provide statistical measures accounting for the uncertainty resulting from landscape variability and measurement errors in ecosystem variables. The basic concept of our approach is to determine the statistical properties of small-scale (within-pixel) variability and observational errors, and to use this information to correct for their effect when large-scale area averages (pixel) are compared to small-scale point estimates. We demonstrate our approach by comparing simulated values of aboveground biomass, woody productivity (woody net primary productivity, NPP) and residence time of woody biomass from four dynamic global vegetation models (DGVMs) with measured inventory data from permanent plots in the Amazon rainforest, a region with the typical problem of low data availability, potential scale mismatch and thus high model uncertainty. We find that the DGVMs under- and overestimate aboveground biomass by 25% and up to 60%, respectively. Our comparison metrics provide a quantitative measure for model-data agreement and show moderate to good agreement with the region-wide spatial biomass pattern detected by plot observations. However, all four DGVMs overestimate woody productivity and underestimate residence time of woody biomass even when accounting for the large uncertainty range of the observational data. This is because DGVMs do not represent the relation between productivity and residence time of woody biomass correctly. Thus, the DGVMs may simulate the correct large-scale patterns of biomass but for the wrong reasons. We conclude that more information about the underlying processes driving biomass distribution are necessary to improve DGVMs. Our approach provides robust statistical measures for any pixel-to-point comparison, which is applicable for evaluation of models and remote-sensing products.
Modelling the role of livestock grazing in C and N cycling in grasslands with LPJmL5.0-grazing
2023, Heinke, Jens, Rolinski, Susanne, Müller, Christoph
To represent the impact of grazing livestock on carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) dynamics in grasslands, we implement a livestock module into LPJmL5.0-tillage, a global vegetation and crop model with explicit representation of managed grasslands and pastures, forming LPJmL5.0-grazing. The livestock module uses lactating dairy cows as a generic representation of grazing livestock. The new module explicitly accounts for forage quality in terms of dry-matter intake and digestibility using relationships derived from compositional analyses for different forages. Partitioning of N into milk, feces, and urine as simulated by the new livestock module shows very good agreement with observation-based relationships reported in the literature. Modelled C and N dynamics depend on forage quality (C:N ratios in grazed biomass), forage quantity, livestock densities, manure or fertilizer inputs, soil, atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and climate conditions. Due to the many interacting relationships, C sequestration, GHG emissions, N losses, and livestock productivity show substantial variation in space and across livestock densities. The improved LPJmL5.0-grazing model can now assess the effects of livestock grazing on C and N stocks and fluxes in grasslands. It can also provide insights about the spatio-temporal variability of grassland productivity and about the trade-offs between livestock production and environmental impacts.
Implementing the nitrogen cycle into the dynamic global vegetation, hydrology, and crop growth model LPJmL (version 5.0)
2018, von Bloh, Werner, Schaphoff, Sibyll, Müller, Christoph, Rolinski, Susanne, Waha, Katharina, Zaehle, Sönke
The well-established dynamical global vegetation, hydrology, and crop growth model LPJmL is extended with a terrestrial nitrogen cycle to account for nutrient limitations. In particular, processes of soil nitrogen dynamics, plant uptake, nitrogen allocation, response of photosynthesis and maintenance respiration to varying nitrogen concentrations in plant organs, and agricultural nitrogen management are included in the model. All new model features are described in full detail and the results of a global simulation of the historic past (1901-2009) are presented for evaluation of the model performance. We find that the implementation of nitrogen limitation significantly improves the simulation of global patterns of crop productivity. Regional differences in crop productivity, which had to be calibrated via a scaling of the maximum leaf area index, can now largely be reproduced by the model, except for regions where fertilizer inputs and climate conditions are not the yield-limiting factors. Furthermore, it can be shown that land use has a strong influence on nitrogen losses, increasing leaching by 93 %.
Simulation of the future sea level contribution of Greenland with a new glacial system model
2018, Calov, Reinhard, Beyer, Sebastian, Greve, Ralf, Beckmann, Johanna, Willeit, Matteo, Kleiner, Thomas, Rückamp, Martin, Humbert, Angelika, Ganopolski, Andrey
We introduce the coupled model of the Greenland glacial system IGLOO 1.0, including the polythermal ice sheet model SICOPOLIS (version 3.3) with hybrid dynamics, the model of basal hydrology HYDRO and a parameterization of submarine melt for marine-terminated outlet glaciers. The aim of this glacial system model is to gain a better understanding of the processes important for the future contribution of the Greenland ice sheet to sea level rise under future climate change scenarios. The ice sheet is initialized via a relaxation towards observed surface elevation, imposing the palaeo-surface temperature over the last glacial cycle. As a present-day reference, we use the 1961-1990 standard climatology derived from simulations of the regional atmosphere model MAR with ERA reanalysis boundary conditions. For the palaeo-part of the spin-up, we add the temperature anomaly derived from the GRIP ice core to the years 1961-1990 average surface temperature field. For our projections, we apply surface temperature and surface mass balance anomalies derived from RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 scenarios created by MAR with boundary conditions from simulations with three CMIP5 models. The hybrid ice sheet model is fully coupled with the model of basal hydrology. With this model and the MAR scenarios, we perform simulations to estimate the contribution of the Greenland ice sheet to future sea level rise until the end of the 21st and 23rd centuries. Further on, the impact of elevation-surface mass balance feedback, introduced via the MAR data, on future sea level rise is inspected. In our projections, we found the Greenland ice sheet to contribute between 1.9 and 13.0 cm to global sea level rise until the year 2100 and between 3.5 and 76.4 cm until the year 2300, including our simulated additional sea level rise due to elevation-surface mass balance feedback. Translated into additional sea level rise, the strength of this feedback in the year 2100 varies from 0.4 to 1.7 cm, and in the year 2300 it ranges from 1.7 to 21.8 cm. Additionally, taking the Helheim and Store glaciers as examples, we investigate the role of ocean warming and surface runoff change for the melting of outlet glaciers. It shows that ocean temperature and subglacial discharge are about equally important for the melting of the examined outlet glaciers.
A protocol for an intercomparison of biodiversity and ecosystem services models using harmonized land-use and climate scenarios
2018, Kim, HyeJin, Rosa, Isabel M. D., Alkemade, Rob, Leadley, Paul, Hurtt, George, Popp, Alexander, van Vuuren, Detlef P., Anthoni, Peter, Arneth, Almut, Baisero, Daniele, Caton, Emma, Chaplin-Kramer, Rebecca, Chini, Louise, De Palma, Adriana, Di Fulvio, Fulvio, Di Marco, Moreno, Espinoza, Felipe, Ferrier, Simon, Fujimori, Shinichiro, Gonzalez, Ricardo E., Gueguen, Maya, Guerra, Carlos, Harfoot, Mike, Harwood, Thomas D., Hasegawa, Tomoko, Haverd, Vanessa, Havlík, Petr, Hellweg, Stefanie, Hill, Samantha L. L., Hirata, Akiko, Hoskins, Andrew J., Janse, Jan H., Jetz, Walter, Johnson, Justin A., Krause, Andreas, Leclère, David, Martins, Ines S., Matsui, Tetsuya, Merow, Cory, Obersteiner, Michael, Ohashi, Haruka, Poulter, Benjamin, Purvis, Andy, Quesada, Benjamin, Rondinini, Carlo, Schipper, Aafke M., Sharp, Richard, Takahashi, Kiyoshi, Thuiller, Wilfried, Titeux, Nicolas, Visconti, Piero, Ware, Christopher, Wolf, Florian, Pereira, Henrique M.
To support the assessments of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), the IPBES Expert Group on Scenarios and Models is carrying out an intercomparison of biodiversity and ecosystem services models using harmonized scenarios (BES-SIM). The goals of BES-SIM are (1) to project the global impacts of land-use and climate change on biodiversity and ecosystem services (i.e., nature's contributions to people) over the coming decades, compared to the 20th century, using a set of common metrics at multiple scales, and (2) to identify model uncertainties and research gaps through the comparisons of projected biodiversity and ecosystem services across models. BES-SIM uses three scenarios combining specific Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs) and Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs)-SSP1xRCP2.6, SSP3xRCP6.0, SSP5xRCP8.6-to explore a wide range of land-use change and climate change futures. This paper describes the rationale for scenario selection, the process of harmonizing input data for land use, based on the second phase of the Land Use Harmonization Project (LUH2), and climate, the biodiversity and ecosystem services models used, the core simulations carried out, the harmonization of the model output metrics, and the treatment of uncertainty. The results of this collaborative modeling project will support the ongoing global assessment of IPBES, strengthen ties between IPBES and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scenarios and modeling processes, advise the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) on its development of a post-2020 strategic plans and conservation goals, and inform the development of a new generation of nature-centred scenarios.
SURFER v2.0: a flexible and simple model linking anthropogenic CO2 emissions and solar radiation modification to ocean acidification and sea level rise
2022, Martínez Montero, Marina, Crucifix, Michel, Couplet, Victor, Brede, Nuria, Botta, Nicola
We present SURFER, a novel reduced model for estimating the impact of CO2 emissions and solar radiation modification options on sea level rise and ocean acidification over timescales of several thousands of years. SURFER has been designed for the analysis of CO2 emission and solar radiation modification policies, for supporting the computation of optimal (CO2 emission and solar radiation modification) policies and for the study of commitment and responsibility under uncertainty. The model is based on a combination of conservation laws for the masses of atmospheric and oceanic carbon and for the oceanic temperature anomalies, and of ad-hoc parameterisations for the different sea level rise contributors: ice sheets, glaciers and ocean thermal expansion. It consists of 9 loosely coupled ordinary differential equations, is understandable, fast and easy to modify and calibrate. It reproduces the results of more sophisticated, high-dimensional earth system models on timescales up to millennia.
The Earth system model CLIMBER-X v1.0 - Part 2: The global carbon cycle
2023, Willeit, Matteo, Ilyina, Tatiana, Liu, Bo, Heinze, Christoph, Perrette, Mahé, Heinemann, Malte, Dalmonech, Daniela, Brovkin, Victor, Munhoven, Guy, Börker, Janine, Hartmann, Jens, Romero-Mujalli, Gibran, Ganopolski, Andrey
The carbon cycle component of the newly developed Earth system model of intermediate complexity CLIMBER-X is presented. The model represents the cycling of carbon through the atmosphere, vegetation, soils, seawater and marine sediments. Exchanges of carbon with geological reservoirs occur through sediment burial, rock weathering and volcanic degassing. The state-of-the-art HAMOCC6 model is employed to simulate ocean biogeochemistry and marine sediment processes. The land model PALADYN simulates the processes related to vegetation and soil carbon dynamics, including permafrost and peatlands. The dust cycle in the model allows for an interactive determination of the input of the micro-nutrient iron into the ocean. A rock weathering scheme is implemented in the model, with the weathering rate depending on lithology, runoff and soil temperature. CLIMBER-X includes a simple representation of the methane cycle, with explicitly modelled natural emissions from land and the assumption of a constant residence time of CH4 in the atmosphere. Carbon isotopes 13C and 14C are tracked through all model compartments and provide a useful diagnostic for model-data comparison. A comprehensive evaluation of the model performance for the present day and the historical period shows that CLIMBER-X is capable of realistically reproducing the historical evolution of atmospheric CO2 and CH4 but also the spatial distribution of carbon on land and the 3D structure of biogeochemical ocean tracers. The analysis of model performance is complemented by an assessment of carbon cycle feedbacks and model sensitivities compared to state-of-the-art Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) models. Enabling an interactive carbon cycle in CLIMBER-X results in a relatively minor slow-down of model computational performance by ∼ 20 % compared to a throughput of ∼ 10 000 simulation years per day on a single node with 16 CPUs on a high-performance computer in a climate-only model set-up. CLIMBER-X is therefore well suited to investigating the feedbacks between climate and the carbon cycle on temporal scales ranging from decades to >100000 years.
The GGCMI Phase 2 emulators: Global gridded crop model responses to changes in CO2, temperature, water, and nitrogen (version 1.0)
2020, Franke, James A., Müller, Christoph, Elliott, Joshua, Ruane, Alex C., Jägermeyr, Jonas, Snyder, Abigail, Dury, Marie, Falloon, Pete D., Folberth, Christian, François, Louis, Hank, Tobias, Izaurralde, R. Cesar, Jacquemin, Ingrid, Jones, Curtis, Li, Michelle, Liu, Wenfeng, Olin, Stefan, Phillips, Meridel, Pugh, Thomas A. M., Reddy, Ashwan, Williams, Karina, Wang, Ziwei, Zabel, Florian, Moyer, Elisabeth J.
Statistical emulation allows combining advantageous features of statistical and process-based crop models for understanding the effects of future climate changes on crop yields. We describe here the development of emulators for nine process-based crop models and five crops using output from the Global Gridded Model Intercomparison Project (GGCMI) Phase 2. The GGCMI Phase 2 experiment is designed with the explicit goal of producing a structured training dataset for emulator development that samples across four dimensions relevant to crop yields: Atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations, temperature, water supply, and nitrogen inputs (CTWN). Simulations are run under two different adaptation assumptions: That growing seasons shorten in warmer climates, and that cultivar choice allows growing seasons to remain fixed. The dataset allows emulating the climatological-mean yield response of all models with a simple polynomial in mean growing-season values. Climatological-mean yields are a central metric in climate change impact analysis; we show here that they can be captured without relying on interannual variations. In general, emulation errors are negligible relative to differences across crop models or even across climate model scenarios; errors become significant only in some marginal lands where crops are not currently grown. We demonstrate that the resulting GGCMI emulators can reproduce yields under realistic future climate simulations, even though the GGCMI Phase 2 dataset is constructed with uniform CTWN offsets, suggesting that the effects of changes in temperature and precipitation distributions are small relative to those of changing means. The resulting emulators therefore capture relevant crop model responses in a lightweight, computationally tractable form, providing a tool that can facilitate model comparison, diagnosis of interacting factors affecting yields, and integrated assessment of climate impacts. © 2020 EDP Sciences. All rights reserved.
LandInG 1.0: a toolbox to derive input datasets for terrestrial ecosystem modelling at variable resolutions from heterogeneous sources
2023, Ostberg, Sebastian, Müller, Christoph, Heinke, Jens, Schaphoff, Sibyll
We present the Land Input Generator (LandInG) version 1.0, a new toolbox for generating input datasets for terrestrial ecosystem models (TEMs) from diverse and partially conflicting data sources. While LandInG 1.0 is applicable to process data for any TEM, it is developed specifically for the open-source dynamic global vegetation, hydrology, and crop growth model LPJmL (Lund-Potsdam-Jena with managed Land). The toolbox documents the sources and processing of data to model inputs and allows for easy changes to the spatial resolution. It is designed to make inconsistencies between different sources of data transparent so that users can make their own decisions on how to resolve these should they not be content with the default assumptions made here. As an example, we use the toolbox to create input datasets at 5 and 30 arcmin spatial resolution covering land, country, and region masks, soil, river networks, freshwater reservoirs, irrigation water distribution networks, crop-specific annual land use, fertilizer, and manure application. We focus on the toolbox describing the data processing rather than only publishing the datasets as users may want to make different choices for reconciling inconsistencies, aggregation, spatial extent, or similar. Also, new data sources or new versions of existing data become available continuously, and the toolbox approach allows for incorporating new data to stay up to date.
A confined-unconfined aquifer model for subglacial hydrology and its application to the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream
2018, Beyer, Sebastian, Kleiner, Thomas, Aizinger, Vadym, Rückamp, Martin, Humbert, Angelika
Subglacial hydrology plays an important role in ice sheet dynamics as it determines the sliding velocity. It also drives freshwater into the ocean, leading to undercutting of calving fronts by plumes. Modeling subglacial water has been a challenge for decades. Only recently have new approaches been developed such as representing subglacial channels and thin water sheets by separate layers of variable hydraulic conductivity. We extend this concept by modeling a confined-unconfined aquifer system (CUAS) in a single layer of an equivalent porous medium (EPM). The advantage of this formulation is that it prevents unphysical values of pressure at reasonable computational cost. We performed sensitivity tests to investigate the effect of different model parameters. The strongest influence of model parameters was detected in terms of governing the opening and closure of the system. Furthermore, we applied the model to the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream, where an efficient system independent of seasonal input was identified about 500 km downstream from the ice divide. Using the effective pressure from the hydrology model, the Ice Sheet System Model (ISSM) showed considerable improvements in modeled velocities in the coastal region.