Investigating Saharan Heat Low Biases in the CMIP5 Dataset

Understanding West African climate is highly important to the people who live in the region and depend on monsoon precipitation, as well as those affected by the North Atlantic hurricane season. Recent studies have shown the importance of the African Easterly Jet (AEJ), the African Easterly Waves (AEWs), and the Saharan Heat Low (SHL) in understanding the duration and onset of the West African Monsoon (WAM). Strong biases in these features in the CMIP5 dataset make climate projection difficult. This study focuses on the SHL, which has been shown to be connected with the monsoon on both short and long timescales. How do the CMIP5 models represent the location and strength of the heat low? How is this feature connected with other model biases? Indexes for the strength and location of the heat low are generated and correlated with moisture, precipitation, sea level pressure, and other fields. The identification of structures that co-vary within the models allow us to better understand how the models represent West African climate and hypothesize mechanisms that lead to these strong model biases.