High-Resolution Weather Forecasting: A Teraflop Sustained on RISC/cache or Vector Processors

Author(s):  
S. J. Thomas ◽  
M. Desgagné ◽  
M. Valin
Author(s):  
Pedro Herruzo ◽  
Aleksandra Gruca ◽  
Llorenc Lliso ◽  
Xavier Calbet ◽  
Pilar Ripodas ◽  
...  

2008 ◽  
Vol 136 (9) ◽  
pp. 3408-3424 ◽  
Author(s):  
Humphrey W. Lean ◽  
Peter A. Clark ◽  
Mark Dixon ◽  
Nigel M. Roberts ◽  
Anna Fitch ◽  
...  

Abstract With many operational centers moving toward order 1-km-gridlength models for routine weather forecasting, this paper presents a systematic investigation of the properties of high-resolution versions of the Met Office Unified Model for short-range forecasting of convective rainfall events. The authors describe a suite of configurations of the Met Office Unified Model running with grid lengths of 12, 4, and 1 km and analyze results from these models for a number of convective cases from the summers of 2003, 2004, and 2005. The analysis includes subjective evaluation of the rainfall fields and comparisons of rainfall amounts, initiation, cell statistics, and a scale-selective verification technique. It is shown that the 4- and 1-km-gridlength models often give more realistic-looking precipitation fields because convection is represented explicitly rather than parameterized. However, the 4-km model representation suffers from large convective cells and delayed initiation because the grid length is too long to correctly reproduce the convection explicitly. These problems are not as evident in the 1-km model, although it does suffer from too numerous small cells in some situations. Both the 4- and 1-km models suffer from poor representation at the start of the forecast in the period when the high-resolution detail is spinning up from the lower-resolution (12 km) starting data used. A scale-selective precipitation verification technique implies that for later times in the forecasts (after the spinup period) the 1-km model performs better than the 12- and 4-km models for lower rainfall thresholds. For higher thresholds the 4-km model scores almost as well as the 1-km model, and both do better than the 12-km model.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Taylor ◽  
Pablo Larraonndo ◽  
Bronis de Supinski

Abstract Society has benefited enormously from the continuous advancement in numerical weather prediction that has occurred over many decades driven by a combination of outstanding scientific, computational and technological breakthroughs. Here we demonstrate that data driven methods are now positioned to contribute to the next wave of major advances in atmospheric science. We show that data driven models can predict important meteorological quantities of interest to society such as global high resolution precipitation fields (0.25 degrees) and can deliver accurate forecasts of the future state of the atmosphere without prior knowledge of the laws of physics and chemistry. We also show how these data driven methods can be scaled to run on super-computers with up to 1024 modern graphics processing units (GPU) and beyond resulting in rapid training of data driven models, thus supporting a cycle of rapid research and innovation. Taken together, these two results illustrate the significant potential of data driven methods to advance atmospheric science and operational weather forecasting.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Bessardon ◽  
Emily Gleeson ◽  
Eoin Walsh

<p>An accurate representation of surface processes is essential for weather forecasting as it is where most of the thermal, turbulent and humidity exchanges occur. The Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) system, to represent these exchanges, requires a land-cover classification map to calculate the surface parameters used in the turbulent, radiative, heat, and moisture fluxes estimations.</p><p>The land-cover classification map used in the HARMONIE-AROME configuration of the shared ALADIN-HIRLAM NWP system for operational weather forecasting is ECOCLIMAP. ECOCLIMAP-SG (ECO-SG), the latest version of ECOCLIMAP, was evaluated over Ireland to prepare ECO-SG implementation in HARMONIE-AROME. This evaluation suggested that sparse urban areas are underestimated and instead appear as vegetation areas in ECO-SG [1], with an over-classification of grassland in place of sparse urban areas and other vegetation covers (Met Éireann internal communication). Some limitations in the performance of the current HARMONIE-AROME configuration attributed to surface processes and physiography issues are well-known [2]. This motivated work at Met Éireann to evaluate solutions to improve the land-cover map in HARMONIE-AROME.</p><p>In terms of accuracy, resolution, and the future production of time-varying land-cover map, the use of a convolutional neural network (CNN) to create a land-cover map using Sentinel-2 satellite imagery [3] over Estonia [4] presented better potential outcomes than the use of local datasets [5]. Consequently, this method was tested over Ireland and proven to be more accurate than ECO-SG for representing CORINE Primary and Secondary labels and at a higher resolution [5]. This work is a continuity of [5] focusing on 1. increasing the number of labels, 2. optimising the training procedure, 3. expanding the method for application to other HIRLAM countries and 4. implementation of the new land-cover map in HARMONIE-AROME.</p><p> </p><p>[1] Bessardon, G., Gleeson, E., (2019) Using the best available physiography to improve weather forecasts for Ireland. In EMS Annual Meeting.Retrieved fromhttps://presentations.copernicus.org/EMS2019-702_presentation.pdf</p><p>[2] Bengtsson, L., Andrae, U., Aspelien, T., Batrak, Y., Calvo, J., de Rooy, W.,. . . Køltzow, M. Ø. (2017). The HARMONIE–AROME Model Configurationin the ALADIN–HIRLAM NWP System. Monthly Weather Review, 145(5),1919–1935.https://doi.org/10.1175/mwr-d-16-0417.1</p><p>[3] Bertini, F., Brand, O., Carlier, S., Del Bello, U., Drusch, M., Duca, R., Fernandez, V., Ferrario, C., Ferreira, M., Isola, C., Kirschner, V.,Laberinti, P., Lambert, M., Mandorlo, G., Marcos, P., Martimort, P., Moon, S., Oldeman,P., Palomba, M., and Pineiro, J.: Sentinel-2ESA’s Optical High-ResolutionMission for GMES Operational Services, ESA bulletin. Bulletin ASE. Euro-pean Space Agency, SP-1322,2012</p><p>[4] Ulmas, P. and Liiv, I. (2020). Segmentation of Satellite Imagery using U-Net Models for Land Cover Classification, pp. 1–11,http://arxiv.org/abs/2003.02899, 2020</p><p>[5] Walsh, E., Bessardon, G., Gleeson, E., and Ulmas, P. (2021). Using machine learning to produce a very high-resolution land-cover map for Ireland. Advances in Science and Research, (accepted for publication)</p>


Author(s):  
L. Abraham ◽  
M. Sasikumar

In the past decades satellite imagery has been used successfully for weather forecasting, geographical and geological applications. Low resolution satellite images are sufficient for these sorts of applications. But the technological developments in the field of satellite imaging provide high resolution sensors which expands its field of application. Thus the High Resolution Satellite Imagery (HRSI) proved to be a suitable alternative to aerial photogrammetric data to provide a new data source for object detection. Since the traffic rates in developing countries are enormously increasing, vehicle detection from satellite data will be a better choice for automating such systems. In this work, a novel technique for vehicle detection from the images obtained from high resolution sensors is proposed. Though we are using high resolution images, vehicles are seen only as tiny spots, difficult to distinguish from the background. But we are able to obtain a detection rate not less than 0.9. Thereafter we classify the detected vehicles into cars and trucks and find the count of them.


2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 207-224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hylke E. Beck ◽  
Ming Pan ◽  
Tirthankar Roy ◽  
Graham P. Weedon ◽  
Florian Pappenberger ◽  
...  

Abstract. New precipitation (P) datasets are released regularly, following innovations in weather forecasting models, satellite retrieval methods, and multi-source merging techniques. Using the conterminous US as a case study, we evaluated the performance of 26 gridded (sub-)daily P datasets to obtain insight into the merit of these innovations. The evaluation was performed at a daily timescale for the period 2008–2017 using the Kling–Gupta efficiency (KGE), a performance metric combining correlation, bias, and variability. As a reference, we used the high-resolution (4 km) Stage-IV gauge-radar P dataset. Among the three KGE components, the P datasets performed worst overall in terms of correlation (related to event identification). In terms of improving KGE scores for these datasets, improved P totals (affecting the bias score) and improved distribution of P intensity (affecting the variability score) are of secondary importance. Among the 11 gauge-corrected P datasets, the best overall performance was obtained by MSWEP V2.2, underscoring the importance of applying daily gauge corrections and accounting for gauge reporting times. Several uncorrected P datasets outperformed gauge-corrected ones. Among the 15 uncorrected P datasets, the best performance was obtained by the ERA5-HRES fourth-generation reanalysis, reflecting the significant advances in earth system modeling during the last decade. The (re)analyses generally performed better in winter than in summer, while the opposite was the case for the satellite-based datasets. IMERGHH V05 performed substantially better than TMPA-3B42RT V7, attributable to the many improvements implemented in the IMERG satellite P retrieval algorithm. IMERGHH V05 outperformed ERA5-HRES in regions dominated by convective storms, while the opposite was observed in regions of complex terrain. The ERA5-EDA ensemble average exhibited higher correlations than the ERA5-HRES deterministic run, highlighting the value of ensemble modeling. The WRF regional convection-permitting climate model showed considerably more accurate P totals over the mountainous west and performed best among the uncorrected datasets in terms of variability, suggesting there is merit in using high-resolution models to obtain climatological P statistics. Our findings provide some guidance to choose the most suitable P dataset for a particular application.


2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 257-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piet Termonia ◽  
Claude Fischer ◽  
Eric Bazile ◽  
François Bouyssel ◽  
Radmila Brožková ◽  
...  

Abstract. The ALADIN System is a numerical weather prediction (NWP) system developed by the international ALADIN consortium for operational weather forecasting and research purposes. It is based on a code that is shared with the global model IFS of the ECMWF and the ARPEGE model of Météo-France. Today, this system can be used to provide a multitude of high-resolution limited-area model (LAM) configurations. A few configurations are thoroughly validated and prepared to be used for the operational weather forecasting in the 16 partner institutes of this consortium. These configurations are called the ALADIN canonical model configurations (CMCs). There are currently three CMCs: the ALADIN baseline CMC, the AROME CMC and the ALARO CMC. Other configurations are possible for research, such as process studies and climate simulations. The purpose of this paper is (i) to define the ALADIN System in relation to the global counterparts IFS and ARPEGE, (ii) to explain the notion of the CMCs, (iii) to document their most recent versions, and (iv) to illustrate the process of the validation and the porting of these configurations to the operational forecast suites of the partner institutes of the ALADIN consortium. This paper is restricted to the forecast model only; data assimilation techniques and postprocessing techniques are part of the ALADIN System but they are not discussed here.


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