Evaluation of a regional climate model for vertical atmospheric simulation over the Mediterranean Region

Abstract

Observed data will be used in order to evaluate a regional climate model, PRECIS (Providing REgional Climates for Impact Studies), by simulating the vertical atmosphere over the Mediterranean region from 1960-1990. PRECIS is a high resolution model, able to simulate the vertical atmospheric column, ranging from 50 m from the surface to 30 km in the stratosphere. Different parameters were considered at specific levels, namely the 925 hPa, 850 hPa, 700 hPa, 500 hPa and the 50 hPa in order to evaluate their vertical variation based on specific conditions on the Earth and in the Atmosphere. The parameters under study were temperature, relative humidity, geopotential height, zonal and meridional wind components. Corresponding measured radiosondes' data available over the PRECIS domain were used. The evaluation will include statistics of 30 year mean vertical profiles over specific grid squares. A different approach on how to evaluate the PRECIS according to different geographical areas will be presented.