Identification

Title

Robustness of CMIP6 historical global mean temperature simulations: Trends, longâ€�term persistence, autocorrelation, and distributional shape

Abstract

Multi-model climate experiments carried out as part of different phases of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP) are crucial to evaluate past and future climate change. The reliability of models' simulations is often gauged by their ability to reproduce the historical climate across many time scales. This study compares the global mean surface air temperature from 29 CMIP6 models with observations from three datasets. We examine (1) warming and cooling rates in five subperiods from 1880 to 2014, (2) autocorrelation and long-term persistence, (3) models' performance based on probabilistic and entropy metrics, and (4) the distributional shape of temperature. All models simulate the observed long-term warming trend from 1880 to 2014. The late twentieth century warming (1975-2014) and the hiatus (1942-1975) are replicated by most models. The post-1998 warming is overestimated in 90% of the simulations. Only six out of 29 models reproduce the observed long-term persistence. All models show differences in distributional shape when compared with observations. Varying performance across metrics reveals the challenge to determine the "best" model. Thus, we argue that models should be selected, based on case-specific metrics, depending on the intended use. Metrics proposed here facilitate a comprehensive assessment for various applications.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7qc06x1

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2020-10-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact