Global Model Test Bed: Fostering Community Involvement in NOAA's Next-Generation Global Prediction System

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is developing a Next-Generation Global Prediction System (NGGPS) with the goal of producing operational forecast guidance for various scales (from weather prediction to seasonal) involving modeling components (atmosphere, chemistry/aerosols, land, ocean, waves, sea ice, and space weather) that exchange information through the NOAA Environmental Modeling System (NEMS) mediator (often called the coupler). Initial NGGPS development is expected to be a five-year community effort, leading to operational implementation in fiscal year 2019. Community involvement for the initial development and subsequent upgrades of NGGPS will be facilitated through a Global Model Test Bed (GMTB).

In this its first year, GMTB has focused on two primary areas, a) facilitating development and testing of advanced physics for NGGPS, and b) supporting the selection of a sea ice model component, both involving close collaborations with the Environmental Modeling Center (EMC) of the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) and community scientists. The activities in advanced physics were multifaceted. To facilitate the community participation in NGGPS, GMTB started the development of a Common Community Physics Package (CCPP), which is initially based on the GFS physics suite, and an interoperable physics driver that allows the use of the CCPP with multiple dynamic cores. This software architecture advances the interests of the National Unified Operational Prediction Capability (NUOPC), as it sets the stage for interchanging physics suites among its participants. Additionally, GMTB began the development of a hierarchical testing “harness” for evaluating innovations in atmospheric physics. This harness contains a variety of tools, ranging from a single-column model to an automated workflow for running, postprocessing, and evaluating physics for global models. This harness was used to assess an advanced cumulus parameterization option for the NCEP Global Forecast System, the Grell-Freitas scale-aware scheme. Regarding GMTB’s second focus area for this year, the selection of a sea ice model component for NGGPS was accomplished through a community workshop to gather input to the process, and a follow-up test of a candidate model.

In this presentation we will review progress of the development of CCPP and the physics tests that have been conducted. We will also provide our perspective on the future role of GMTB in support of the continued development of NGGPS.