WP-P3: Extended interface to mesoscale models: expansion to further variables (precipitation, clouds, chemistry) and models; optimisation and parallelisation

Goals of the project:

Already during period 1 of MOSAIK the DWD developed a first version of the mesoscale interface INIFOR (INItialisation and FORcing) for PALM-4U (Kadasch, 2018). With support of INIFOR users can perform and analyse PALM-4U urban microclimate simulations under real synoptical conditions. INIFOR was developed as a stand-alone pre-processor, which is now part of the PALM-4U model system. It provides realistic, non-stationary forcing data for PALM-4U based on the operational output of the mesoscale model COSMO-DE (and its more recent higher-resolution configuration COSMO-D2). The goal within phase 2 of MOSAIK is the extension and improvement of INIFOR to allow the forcing of PALM-4U by further mesoscale models and the consideration of additional parameters, e.g. cloud physical or air quality parameters.

Tasks of the project

The task for period 2 is the expansion and refinement of INIFOR in the following areas:

1. Support of additional mesoscale models

• Including the support of ICON and WRF model output in order to provide a tool for mesoscale model foricng into PALM-4U to a wider range of national and international users to allow PALM-4U simulations with realistic weather conditions.
• Adding the support of output originating from the chemical add-ons of the named models ICON-ART and WRF-Chem in order to also allow the conducting of simulations with realistic mesoscale meteorologic and air pollution conditions.

2. Precipitation

• Expanding of INIFOR to provide PALM-4U with mesoscale precipitation rates and cloud parameters

3. Performance optimisation and parallelisation

• Parallelisation and optimisation of the code to allow faster processing of larger grid sizes by distributing data on cluster nodes

Structure of the project:

The project consists of one work package (P3) which can be divided into five different steps:

WP-P3.1: Introduction to mesoscale models and PALM-4U’s chemistry module

WP-P3.2: Extension of INIFOR to precipitation and cloud-physical parameters

WP-P3.3: Interface to the mesoscale models ICON and WRF including their chemistry extensions

WP-P3.4: Performance optimisation, parallelisation, and documentation

WP-P3.5: Support for model evaluation and new users of INIFOR

Deliverables:

1) Providing long term COSMO time series of precipitation for the use in WP-P5

2) INIFOR release with support for COSMO precipitation and cloud parameters

3) INIFOR release with interface for WRF/WRF-Chem

4) INIFOR release with support for ICON/ICON-ART

5) Parallelised version of INIFOR

6) Documentation for users of the expanded interface

Progress so far:

References:

none

Contacts:

Heike.Noppel[at]dwd.de