Bimodality in simulated precipitation frequency distributions and its relationship with convective parameterizations

Authors:
Open Access
Publisher website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Bimodality in precipitation frequency distributions is often evident in atmospheric models, but rarely in observations. This study i) proposes a metric to objectively quantify the bimodality in precipitation distributions, ii) evaluates model simulations contributed to the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP) phase 5 (CMIP5), phase 6 (CMIP6), and the DYnamics of the Atmospheric general circulation Modeled On Non-hydrostatic Domains (DYAMOND) project by comparing them to satellite-based and reanalysis precipitation products, and iii) investigates possible origins of bimodal precipitation distributions. Our results reveal that about 83% (20 out of 24) of CMIP5 and 70% (21 out of 30) of CMIP6 models used in this study exhibit bimodal distributions. The few DYAMOND models that use a deep convective parameterization also show bimodal distributions, while most DYAMOND models do not. Predictably, the bimodality originates from the separation of precipitation process between resolved grid-scale and parameterized subgrid-scale. However, in a larger number of models bimodality arises from the parameterized subgrid-scale convective precipitation alone.
Funding Information
  • U.S. Department of Energy (DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-AC52-07NA27344)

This publication has 38 references indexed in Scilit: