NASA Releases Detailed Global Climate Change Projections
Alex Brown
NASA Releases Detailed Global Climate Change Projections
http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-releases-detailed-global-climate-change-projections
The dataset, which is available to the public, shows projected changes worldwide on a regional level in response to different scenarios of increasing carbon dioxide simulated by 21 climate models. The high-resolution data, which can be viewed on a daily timescale at the scale of individual cities and towns, will help scientists and planners conduct climate risk assessments to better understand local and global effects of hazards, such as severe drought, floods, heat waves and losses in agriculture productivity. ...
The new dataset is the latest product from the NASA Earth Exchange (NEX), a big-data research platform within the NASA Advanced Supercomputing Center at the agency's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California. In 2013, NEX released similar climate projection data for the continental United States that is being used to quantify climate risks to the nation’s agriculture, forests, rivers and cities....
This NASA dataset integrates actual measurements from around the world with data from climate simulations created by the international Fifth Coupled Model Intercomparison Project. These climate simulations used the best physical models of the climate system available to provide forecasts of what the global climate might look like under two different greenhouse gas emissions scenarios: a “business as usual” scenario based on current trends and an “extreme case” with a significant increase in emissions.
https://cds.nccs.nasa.gov/nex-gddp/
NASA Earth Exchange Global Downscaled Daily Downscaled Projections (NEX-GDDP)
The NASA Earth Exchange Global Daily Downscaled Projections (NEX-GDDP) dataset is comprised of downscaled climate scenarios for the globe that are derived from the General Circulation Model (GCM) runs conducted under the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) and across two of the four greenhouse gas emissions scenarios known as Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs). The CMIP5 GCM runs were developed in support of the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC AR5). The NEX-GDDP dataset includes downscaled projections for RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 from the 21 models and scenarios for which daily scenarios were produced and distributed under CMIP5. Each of the climate projections includes daily maximum temperature, minimum temperature, and precipitation for the periods from 1950 through 2100. The spatial resolution of the dataset is 0.25 degrees (~25 km x 25 km). The NEX-GDDP dataset is provided to assist the science community in conducting studies of climate change impacts at local to regional scales, and to enhance public understanding of possible future global climate patterns at the spatial scale of individual towns, cities, and watersheds.
Each of the climate projections includes monthly averaged maximum temperature, minimum temperature, and precipitation for the periods from 1950 through 2005 (Retrospective Run) and from 2006 to 2099 (Prospective Run).
Alex Brown
- The Nature Conservancy provides a web map server offering a different collection of global model projections than described in the NASA announcement below, which does include projections to 2050 and 2080. This is complex enough that time spent with the resource and documentation links will be well spent.
- Visualizations include comparisons and animations are also available:
NASA Releases Detailed Global Climate Change Projections
http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-releases-detailed-global-climate-change-projections