Cenlin He, Prasanth Valayamkunnath, M. Barlage, Fei Chen, David Gochis, Ryan Cabell, Tim Schneider, Roy Rasmussen, Guo-Yue Niu, Zong-Liang Yang, D. Niyogi, Michael Ek
{"title":"Modernizing the open-source community Noah with multi-parameterization options (Noah-MP) land surface model (version 5.0) with enhanced modularity, interoperability, and applicability","authors":"Cenlin He, Prasanth Valayamkunnath, M. Barlage, Fei Chen, David Gochis, Ryan Cabell, Tim Schneider, Roy Rasmussen, Guo-Yue Niu, Zong-Liang Yang, D. Niyogi, Michael Ek","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5131-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5131-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. The widely used open-source community Noah with multi-parameterization options (Noah-MP) land surface model (LSM) is\u0000designed for applications ranging from uncoupled land surface\u0000hydrometeorological and ecohydrological process studies to coupled numerical\u0000weather prediction and decadal global or regional climate simulations. It has\u0000been used in many coupled community weather, climate, and hydrology models. In\u0000this study, we modernize and refactor the Noah-MP LSM by adopting modern Fortran\u0000code standards and data structures, which substantially enhance the model\u0000modularity, interoperability, and applicability. The modernized Noah-MP is\u0000released as the version 5.0 (v5.0), which has five key features: (1) enhanced modularization as a result of re-organizing model physics into individual\u0000process-level Fortran module files, (2) an enhanced data structure with new\u0000hierarchical data types and optimized variable declaration and\u0000initialization structures, (3) an enhanced code structure and calling workflow\u0000as a result of leveraging the new data structure and modularization, (4) enhanced\u0000(descriptive and self-explanatory) model variable naming standards, and (5) enhanced driver and interface structures to be coupled with the host\u0000weather, climate, and hydrology models. In addition, we create a comprehensive\u0000technical documentation of the Noah-MP v5.0 and a set of model benchmark and\u0000reference datasets. The Noah-MP v5.0 will be coupled to various\u0000weather, climate, and hydrology models in the future. Overall, the modernized\u0000Noah-MP allows a more efficient and convenient process for future model\u0000developments and applications.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41540530","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Xiaoxu Shi, A. Cauquoin, Gerrit Lohmann, L. Jonkers, Qian Wang, Hu Yang, Yuchen Sun, Martin Werner
{"title":"Simulated stable water isotopes during the mid-Holocene and pre-industrial periods using AWI-ESM-2.1-wiso","authors":"Xiaoxu Shi, A. Cauquoin, Gerrit Lohmann, L. Jonkers, Qian Wang, Hu Yang, Yuchen Sun, Martin Werner","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5153-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5153-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Numerical simulations employing prognostic stable water isotopes can not only facilitate our understanding of hydrological processes and climate change but also allow for a direct comparison between isotope signals obtained from models and various archives. In the current work, we describe the performance and explore the potential of a new version of the Earth system model AWI-ESM (Alfred Wegener Institute Earth System Model), labeled AWI-ESM-2.1-wiso, in which we incorporated three isotope tracers into all relevant components of the water cycle. We present here the results of pre-industrial (PI) and mid-Holocene (MH) simulations. The model reproduces the observed PI isotope compositions in both precipitation and seawater well and captures their major differences from the MH conditions. The simulated relationship between the isotope composition in precipitation (δ18Op) and surface air temperature is very similar between the PI and MH conditions, and it is largely consistent with modern observations despite some regional model biases. The ratio of the MH–PI difference in δ18Op to the MH–PI difference in surface air temperature is comparable to proxy records over Greenland and Antarctica only when summertime air temperature is considered. An amount effect is evident over the North African monsoon domain, where a negative correlation between δ18Op and the amount of precipitation is simulated. As an example of model applications, we studied the onset and withdrawal date of the MH West African summer monsoon (WASM) using daily variables. We find that defining the WASM onset based on precipitation alone may yield erroneous results due to the substantial daily variations in precipitation, which may obscure the distinction between pre-monsoon and monsoon seasons. Combining precipitation and isotope indicators, we suggest in this work a novel method for identifying the commencement of the WASM. Moreover, we do not find an obvious difference between the MH and PI periods in terms of the mean onset of the WASM. However, an advancement in the WASM withdrawal is found in the MH compared to the PI period due to an earlier decline in insolation over the northern location of Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ).\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47163460","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jin-Song von Storch, Eileen Hertwig, Veit Lüschow, Nils Brüggemann, Helmuth Haak, Peter Korn, V. Singh
{"title":"Open-ocean tides simulated by ICON-O, version icon-2.6.6","authors":"Jin-Song von Storch, Eileen Hertwig, Veit Lüschow, Nils Brüggemann, Helmuth Haak, Peter Korn, V. Singh","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5179-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5179-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. This paper evaluates barotropic tides simulated by a newly developed multi-layer ocean general circulation, ICON-O, and assesses processes and model configurations that can impact the quality of the simulated tides. Such an investigation is crucial for applications addressing internal tides that are much more difficult to evaluate than the barotropic tides.\u0000Although not specially tuned for tides and not constrained by any observations, ICON-O is capable of producing the main features of the open-ocean barotropic tides as described by the geographical distributions of amplitude, phase, and amphidromic points. An error analysis shows, however, that the open-ocean tides simulated by ICON-O are less accurate than those simulated by two other ocean general circulation models (OGCMs), especially when not properly adjusting the time step and the parameters used in the time-stepping scheme. Based on a suite of tidal experiments, we show that an\u0000increase in horizontal resolution only improves tides in shallow waters. Relevant for using ICON-O with its telescoping grid capacity, we show that spatial inhomogeneity does not deteriorate the quality of the simulated tides. We further show that implementing a parameterization of topographic wave drag improves the quality of the simulated tides in deep ocean independent of the model configuration used, whereas the implementation of a self-attraction and loading (SAL) parameterization in a low-resolution (40 km) version of ICON-O degrades the quality of tides in shallow ocean.\u0000Finally, we show that the quality of tides simulated by ICON-O with low resolution (40 km) can be significantly improved by adjusting the time step or the parameters in the time-stepping scheme used for obtaining the model solution.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49307180","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Mingzhao Liu, L. Hoffmann, S. Griessbach, Z. Cai, Yi Heng, Xue Wu
{"title":"Improved representation of volcanic sulfur dioxide depletion in Lagrangian transport simulations: a case study with MPTRAC v2.4","authors":"Mingzhao Liu, L. Hoffmann, S. Griessbach, Z. Cai, Yi Heng, Xue Wu","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5197-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5197-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. The lifetime of sulfur dioxide (SO2) in the Earth's atmosphere varies from orders of hours to weeks, mainly depending on whether cloud water is present or not. The volcanic eruption on Ambae Island, Vanuatu, in July 2018 injected a large amount of SO2 into the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UT/LS) region with abundant cloud cover. In-cloud removal is therefore expected to play an important role during long-range transport and dispersion of SO2. In order to better represent the rapid decay processes of SO2 observed by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) and the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) in Lagrangian transport simulations, we simulate the SO2 decay in a more realistic manner compared to our earlier work, considering gas-phase hydroxyl (OH) chemistry, aqueous-phase hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) chemistry, wet deposition, and convection. The either newly developed or improved chemical and physical modules are implemented in the Lagrangian transport model Massive-Parallel Trajectory Calculations (MPTRAC) and tested in a case study for the July 2018 Ambae eruption. To access the dependencies of the SO2 lifetime on the complex atmospheric conditions, sensitivity tests are conducted by tuning the control parameters, e.g., by changing the release height, the predefined OH climatology data, the cloud pH value, the cloud cover, and other variables. Wet deposition and aqueous-phase H2O2 oxidation remarkably increased the decay rate of the SO2 total mass, which leads to a rapid and more realistic depletion of the Ambae plume. The improved representation of chemical and physical SO2 loss processes described here is expected to lead to more realistic Lagrangian transport simulations of volcanic eruption events with MPTRAC in future work.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46469224","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Metrics for evaluating the quality in linear atmospheric inverse problems: a case study of a trace gas inversion","authors":"Vineet Yadav, Subhomoy Ghosh, Charles E. Miller","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5219-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5219-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Several metrics have been proposed and utilized to diagnose the performance of linear Bayesian and geostatistical atmospheric inverse problems. These metrics primarily assess the reductions in the prior uncertainties, compare modeled observations to true observations, and check distributional assumptions. Although important, these metrics should be augmented with a sensitivity analysis to obtain a comprehensive understanding of the atmospheric inversion performance and improve the quality and confidence in the inverse estimates. In this study, we derive closed-form expressions of local sensitivities for various input parameters, including measurements, covariance parameters, covariates, and a forward operator. To further enhance our understanding, we complement the local sensitivity analysis with a framework for a global sensitivity analysis that can apportion the uncertainty in input parameters to the uncertainty associated with inverse estimates. Additionally, we propose a mathematical framework to construct nonstationary correlation matrices from a precomputed forward operator, which is closely tied to the overall quality of inverse estimates. We demonstrate the application of our methodology in the context of an atmospheric inverse problem for estimating methane fluxes in Los Angeles, California.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45323578","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Hazard assessment modeling and software development of earthquake-triggered landslides in the Sichuan–Yunnan area, China","authors":"Xiaoyi Shao, Si-yuan Ma, Chong Xu","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5113-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5113-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. To enhance the timeliness and accuracy of spatial prediction of\u0000coseismic landslides, we propose an improved three-stage spatial prediction\u0000strategy and develop corresponding hazard assessment software named\u0000Mat.LShazard V1.0. Based on this software, we evaluate the applicability of\u0000this improved spatial prediction strategy in six earthquake events that have\u0000occurred near the Sichuan–Yunnan region, including the Wenchuan, Ludian,\u0000Lushan, Jiuzhaigou, Minxian, and Yushu earthquakes. The results indicate that\u0000in the first stage (immediately after the quake event), except for the 2013\u0000Minxian earthquake, the area under the curve (AUC) values of the modeling performance are above 0.8. Among them, the AUC value of the Wenchuan\u0000earthquake is the highest, reaching 0.947. The prediction results in the\u0000first stage can meet the requirements of emergency rescue by immediately\u0000obtaining the overall predicted information of the possible coseismic\u0000landslide locations in the quake-affected area. In the second and third\u0000stages, with the improvement of landslide data quality, the prediction\u0000ability of the model based on the entire landslide database is gradually\u0000improved. Based on the entire landslide database, the AUC value of the six\u0000events exceeds 0.9, indicating a very high prediction accuracy. For the\u0000second and third stages, the predicted landslide area (Ap) is relatively\u0000consistent with the observed landslide area (Ao). However, based on the\u0000incomplete landslide data in the meizoseismal area, Ap is much smaller than\u0000Ao. When the prediction model based on complete landslide data is built, Ap\u0000is nearly identical to Ao. This study provides a new application tool for\u0000coseismic landslide disaster prevention and mitigation in different stages\u0000of emergency rescue, temporary resettlement, and late reconstruction after a\u0000major earthquake.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43488740","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Use of threshold parameter variation for tropical cyclone tracking","authors":"Bernhard M. Enz, Jan P. Engelmann, U. Lohmann","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5093-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5093-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Assessing the capacity of numerical models to produce viable tropical cyclones, as well as assessing the climatological behavior of simulated tropical cyclones, requires an objective tracking method. These make use of parameter thresholds to determine whether a detected feature, such as a vorticity maximum or a warm core, is strong enough to indicate a tropical cyclone. The choice of parameter thresholds is generally subjective.\u0000This study proposes and assesses the parallel use of many threshold parameter combinations, combining a number of weaker and stronger values. The tracking algorithm succeeds in tracking tropical cyclones within the model data, beginning at their aggregation stage or shortly thereafter and ending when they interact strongly with extratropical flow and transition into extratropical cyclones or when their warm core decays.\u0000The sensitivity of accumulated cyclone energy to tracking errors is assessed. Tracking errors include the faulty initial detection and termination of valid tropical cyclones and systems falsely identified as tropical cyclones. They are found to not significantly impact the accumulated cyclone energy. Thus, the tracking algorithm produces an adequate estimate of the accumulated cyclone energy within the underlying data.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46335701","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Passive-tracer modelling at super-resolution with Weather Research and Forecasting – Advanced Research WRF (WRF-ARW) to assess mass-balance schemes","authors":"S. Fathi, Mark Gordon, Yongsheng Chen","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5069-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5069-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Super-resolution atmospheric modelling can be used to interpret and optimize environmental observations during top-down emission rate retrieval campaigns (e.g. aircraft-based) by providing complementary data that closely correspond to real-world atmospheric pollution transport and dispersion conditions. For this work, super-resolution model simulations with large-eddy-simulation sub-grid-scale parameterization were developed and implemented using WRF-ARW (Weather Research and Forecasting - Advanced Research WRF). We demonstrate a series of best practices for improved (realistic) modelling of atmospheric pollutant dispersion at super-resolutions. These include careful considerations for grid quality over complex terrain, sub-grid turbulence parameterization at the scale of large eddies, and ensuring local and global tracer mass conservation. The study objective was to resolve small dynamical processes inclusive of spatio-temporal scales of high-speed (e.g. 100 m s−1) airborne measurements. This was achieved by downscaling of reanalysis data from 31.25 km to 50 m through multi-domain model nesting in the horizontal and grid-refining in the vertical. Further, WRF dynamical-solver source code was modified to simulate the release of passive tracers within the finest-resolution domain. Different meteorological case studies and several tracer source emission scenarios were considered. Model-generated fields were evaluated against observational data (surface monitoring network and aircraft campaign data) and also in terms of tracer mass conservation. Results indicated agreement between modelled and observed values within 5 ∘C for temperature, 1 %–25 % for relative humidity, and 1–2 standard deviations for wind fields. Model performance in terms of (global and local) tracer mass conservation was within 2 % to 5 % of model input emissions. We found that, to ensure mass conservation within the modelling domain, tracers should be released on a regular-resolution grid (vertical and horizontal). Further, using our super-resolution modelling products, we investigated emission rate estimations based on flux calculation and mass-balancing. Our results indicate that retrievals under weak advection conditions (horizontal wind speeds < 5 m s−1) are not reliable due to weak correlation between the source emission rate and the downwind tracer mass flux.\u0000In this work we demonstrate the development of accurate super-resolution model simulations useful for planning, interpreting, and optimizing top-down retrievals, and we discuss favourable conditions (e.g. meteorological) for reliable mass-balance emission rate estimations.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46520039","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Rainbows and climate change: a tutorial on climate model diagnostics and parameterization","authors":"A. Gettelman","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-4937-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-4937-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Earth system models (ESMs) must represent processes below the grid scale of a model using representations (parameterizations) of physical and\u0000chemical processes. As a tutorial exercise to understand diagnostics and parameterization, this work presents a representation of rainbows for an\u0000ESM: the Community Earth System Model version 2 (CESM2). Using the “state” of the model, basic physical laws, and some assumptions, we generate a\u0000representation of this unique optical phenomenon as a diagnostic output. Rainbow occurrence and its possible changes are related to cloud occurrence\u0000and rain formation, which are critical uncertainties for climate change prediction. The work highlights issues which are typical of many diagnostic\u0000parameterizations such as assumptions, uncertain parameters, and the difficulty of evaluation against uncertain observations. Results agree\u0000qualitatively with limited available global “observations” of rainbows. Rainbows are seen in expected locations in the subtropics over the ocean\u0000where broken clouds and frequent precipitation occur. The diurnal peak is in the morning over ocean and in the evening over land. The\u0000representation of rainbows is found to be quantitatively sensitive to the assumed amount of cloudiness and the amount of stratiform rain. Rainbows\u0000are projected to have decreased, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, due to aerosol pollution effects increasing cloud coverage since 1850. In the\u0000future, continued climate change is projected to decrease cloud cover, associated with a positive cloud feedback. As a result the rainbow diagnostic\u0000projects that rainbows will increase in the future, with the largest changes at midlatitudes. The diagnostic may be useful for assessing cloud\u0000parameterizations and is an exercise in how to build and test parameterizations of atmospheric phenomena.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48052682","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
D. Reynolds, E. Gutmann, B. Kruyt, Michael Haugeneder, T. Jonas, F. Gerber, M. Lehning, R. Mott
{"title":"The High-resolution Intermediate Complexity Atmospheric Research (HICAR v1.1) model enables fast dynamic downscaling to the hectometer scale","authors":"D. Reynolds, E. Gutmann, B. Kruyt, Michael Haugeneder, T. Jonas, F. Gerber, M. Lehning, R. Mott","doi":"10.5194/gmd-16-5049-2023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-5049-2023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. High-resolution (< 1 km) atmospheric modeling is increasingly used to study precipitation distributions in complex terrain and cryosphere–atmospheric processes. While this approach has yielded insightful results, studies over annual timescales or at the spatial extents of watersheds remain unrealistic due to the computational costs of running most atmospheric models. In this paper we introduce a high-resolution variant of the Intermediate Complexity Atmospheric Research (ICAR) model, HICAR. We detail the model development that enabled HICAR simulations at the hectometer scale, including changes to the advection scheme and the wind solver. The latter uses near-surface terrain parameters which allow HICAR to simulate complex topographic flow features. These model improvements clearly influence precipitation distributions at the ridge scale (50 m), suggesting that HICAR can approximate processes dependent on particle–flow interactions such as preferential deposition. A 250 m HICAR simulation over most of the Swiss Alps also shows monthly precipitation patterns similar to two different gridded precipitation products which assimilate available observations. Benchmarking runs show that HICAR uses 594 times fewer computational resources than the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) atmospheric model. This gain in efficiency makes dynamic downscaling accessible to ecohydrological research, where downscaled data are often required at hectometer resolution for whole basins at seasonal timescales. These results motivate further development of HICAR, including refinement of parameterizations used in the wind solver and coupling of the model with an intermediate-complexity snow model.\u0000","PeriodicalId":12799,"journal":{"name":"Geoscientific Model Development","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48269400","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}