21 November 2009 GEO Water Cycle Integration Workshop, Frascati, Italy 1

Precipitation and Water (and Energy)Cycle Integration

WA-08-01d, led by the International Precipitation Working Group (IPWG)

2009-2010 IPWG Co-Chairs:

George J. HuffmanScience Systems and Applications, Inc. and

NASA Goddard Space Flight CenterGreenbelt, MD USA

Christian KleppUniversity of Hamburg and

Max-Planck Institute for Meteorology Hamburg, Germany

Presented by:

Chris KiddUniversity of Birmingham,

Birmingham, U.K.

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Outline

• Current activities

• The future

• Integration

• Summary

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IPWG was established under CGMS to:

• Promote standard operational procedures and common software for deriving precipitation estimates from satellites

• Establish standards for validation and independent verification of precipitation estimates

• Foster the exchange of data on inter-comparisons of operational precipitation estimates from satellites

• Stimulate increased international scientific research and development in this field

• Provide recommendations to national and international agencies regarding the utilization of current and future satellite instruments on both polar and geostationary platforms

• Encourage regular education and training activities

CGMS nominated IPWG to lead the GEO precip subtask, WA-08-01d in 2008

A Word About IPWG

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Sub-task definition (as given in the 2009-2011 Work Plan):

• Under the guidance of CGMS/IPWG

- promote and advance the development and validation of multi-sensor satellite-based precip estimates

- including snowfall

• Inputs from the Precipitation Virtual Constellation (AR-09-02a) will supplement these efforts

Scope of the GEO precip activity

• Integrate satellite data and products with surface observations and numerical model information to provide long-term, fine-scale records of global precip

• Participate in analyses of the global water and energy cycle (WEC)

- explore this crucial element of the global environment

- constrain the permissible values of precip by comparison to estimates of the other components

A Word About the GEO Precip Sub-task

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Or More Graphically

We want to get

better at turning this

TRMM Sat-Gauge (mm/h) 00Z 01 March 2000

into this

Images courtesy GPM (top), George Huffman (bottom)

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Current Data Sets

Most WEC activities depend on multi-satellite data sets

• Provides quasi-gobal, consistent coverage over a long span

• GPCP provides the longest records

- Satellite-Gauge monthly 2.5°x2.5° 1979-present

- Pentad (5-day) 2.5°x2.5° 1979-present

- One-Degree Daily (1DD) 1°x1° October 1996-present

- Pentad, 1DD constrained to add up to the monthly

• “High resolution precipitation products” provide more detail

- CMORPH 0.08°x0.08° December 2002-present

- GSMaP 0.10°x0.10° 1998-2006 (NRT October 2007-present)

- NRL MW/IR 0.25°x0.25° 2004-present

- PERSIANN 0.25°x0.25° March 2000-present

- TMPA 0.25°x0.25° 1998-present (current RT October 2008-present)

- the region of coverage is around 50°N-50°S in all cases

• GPCC provides a consistent, on-going source of global gauge analyses

• GPCP and TMPA products use monthly gauge data

- important bias corrections, but only in gauged regions

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Recent Activities (1/2)

Excellent precip datasets depend on excellence at every stage

• Ongoing precip-relevant satellite constellation, rain gauge network

- advocate continuation of “old” platforms (prior DMSP and NOAA platforms, TRMM)

- advocate future missions (GPM, MegaTropique)

- support CEOS planning

• Calibration and quality control for input data

- IPWG interaction with International TOVS Working Group; NASA/PMM XCAL

• Timely, open access to data

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Recent Activities (2/2)

Excellent precip datasets depend on excellence at every stage (cont.)

• Development and validation of algorithms

- improved GPCC rain gauge analysis

- continued improvement in “traditional” passive microwave (GPROF, GSMaP, HOAPS)

- work on “high-frequency” passive microwave for snow, cold season use

- multi-spectral VIS/IR algorithms (driven by GOES-R, MSG sensors)

- Kalman smoother schemes in CMORPH, GSMaP

- additional, upgraded inputs for Version 7 TMPA

- retrospective CMOPRH processing back to 1998

- use of the new GPCC analyses in GPCP Version 2.1

• Development and validation of numerical analyses

- IPWG interaction with Working Group on Numerical Experimentation for parallel validation of observed and numerical precip estimates

• Dataset archives focused on stable long-term, global, homogeneously processed estimates

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The Future

Single-sensor

• Continued focus on “difficult” situations

- snow, cold season

- coastal areas

- complex terrain

Multi-satellite

• Continued focus on Lagrangian time interpolation

• Approaches to the “development problem” - precip patterns change between passive microwave overpasses

• Use submonthly rain gauge data in satellite-gauge combination products

• Refined schemes for estimating precip errors

- develop parameterized multi-scale expressions for bias, RMS, etc.

• Merged observation-numerical estimates in parallel to observation-only products

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Integration Activities

There’s a great deal of interaction that just hasn’t been cast in a GEO framework

Work with specific users or specific WEC interactions

• Flood/drought

- FEWSNet, H-SAF, IFNet, Mekong River Commission, SERVIR, TRMM flood/landslide alerts

- hydrological modelers

- the key issue is the sensor-, scale-, and regime-dependent error in the precip products

• Soil moisture

- land-process modelers

- soil moisture satellites (SMAP, SMOS)

• Assimilation of precip data in numerical initialization systems

WEC integration; to repeat:

• explore this crucial element of the global environment

• constrain the permissible values of precip by comparison to estimates of the other components

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GEWEX Radiation Panel (GRP)

Within GEWEX the GRP produces long-term global observational WEC data sets

GRP plans to produce an integrated WEC product (probably 3 hr, 50 km)

• combine all GRP individual products into a single file for use in WEC budget studies

- aerosols (GACP)

- clouds (ISCCP)

- precipitation (GPCP, including raingauge analysis by GPCC)

- surface fluxes (SeaFlux, LandFlux)

- surface radiation (SRB)

- TOA radiation (CERES)

Graphic courtesy William Rossow

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Current GRP Data Sets

Graphic courtesy Christian Kummerow

(From 2008 report)

250/100 km

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NASA Energy and Water Studies (NEWS)

NEWS Challenge: • Document and enable improved, observationally-based predictions of • water and energy cycle consequences of • Earth system variability and change

NEWS is intended to be integrative

There are lots of connections:

Logos courtesy Deborah Belvedere

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NASA Energy and Water Studies (NEWS)

NEWS cross-cutting focus groups

• Drought & Flood Extremes - including water and energy aspects of abrupt climate change

• Evaporation & Latent Heating - including both land and ocean

• Energy & Water Cycle Climatology - exploit and influence evolving observing systems

- key goal to use uncertainties in individual components to estimate adjustments that create a better “fit” to the WEC as a whole

• Modeling & Water Cycle Prediction - foster interaction with the global modeling community

• The goal is big-picture use of the individual P.I. results

http://www.nasa-news.org/integration/  

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Regional-Scale Water Cycle Studies

Asian Water Cycle Initiative

• Focus on Asia and surrounding waters

CEOP

• Focus on GEWEX Continental-Scale Experiment regions

Arctic basin hydrological balance

• Focus on water budgets of the Arctic basin rivers

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Concluding Comments

Reasonably competent long-term global precip data sets are currently available

• The greatest uncertainty is in cold-land conditions and early in the record

There is a substantial effort at improving the end-to-end provision of such data

• The utility of the long-term data sets rests on continued launches to replenish the global constellation of precip-relevant satellites

• Errors at one step in processing usually come back to haunt you at a later step

Substantial efforts are underway to examine the WEC

• GRP, NEWS, and additional efforts

• Involvement of data producers is key to getting the best results; a startling “discovery” for anyone else is frequently a well-known “feature” to the data producer

What more does GEO need to be doing?

• Improve interaction with additional groups

• Advocate for the necessary resources (satellites, archive reanalysis activities, etc.)

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Extra Slides

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Interactions with WGNE and GEO

IPWG’s validation work is focused through the Program for the Evaluation of High Resolution Precipitation Products (PEHRPP)

• Includes long-term regional-scale efforts in Australia, Japan, South America, the U.S., Western Europe

• WGNE invited to submit numerical model estimates for evaluation in PEHRPP and agreed

• Contributing Centers to date are ECMWF, JMA, Meto-France, NCEP, NRL; GMAO and BOM are expected

• Data are being released or not according to each Center’s policy

IPWG is providing leadership for the GEO precip area

• CGMS recommended the IPWG Co-Chairs for this role

• Co-Chair George Huffman is the “point of contact” for WA-08-01d

• A first task plan was submitted

• Former Co-Chair Chris Kidd will represent IPWG at the GEO Water Cycle Integration workshop 21 November 2009, ESRIN, Frascati, Italy

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Acronyms1DD One-Degree Daily precip productAWCI Asian Water Cycle InitiativeBOM Bureau of Meteorology, AustraiiaCEOS Coordinated Energy and Water Cycle Observations ProjectCERES Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy SystemCGMS Coordinating Group on Meteorological SatellitesCMORPH Climate Prediction Center (CPC) Morphing algorithmDMSP Defense Meteorogical Satellite ProgramECMWF European Centre for Medium-Range Weather ForcastingFEWSNet Famine Early Warning System NetworkGACP GEWEX Aerosol Climatology ProjectGEO Global Earth ObservationsGEWEX Global Energy and Water ExperimentGMAO Global Modeling and Assimilation OfficeGOES-R Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-R SeriesGPCC Global Precipitation Climatology CentreGPCP Global Precipitation Climatology ProjectGPM Global Precipitation Measurement missionGPROF Goddard Profiling algorithmGRP GEWEX Radiation PanelGSMaP Global Satellite Mapping of PrecipitationHOAPS Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite data set

H-SAF Hydrology Satellite Application Facility IPWG International Precipitation Working GroupIFNet International Flood NetworkISCCP International Satellite Cloud Climatology ProjectJMA Japan Meteorological AgencyMSG Meteorological Satellite (METEOSAT) Second GenerationMW/IR Microwave-Calibrated Infrared precip productNASA National Aeronautics and Space AdministrationNCEP National Centers for Environmental PredictionNEWS NASA Energy and Water StudiesNRL Naval Research Laboratory

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AcronymsPEHRPP Program for the Evaluation of High Resolution Precipitation ProductsPERSIANN Precipitation Estimation from Remote Sensing Information using Artificial Neural NetworkPMM Precipitation Measurement MissionsSERVIR Sistema Regional de Visualización y MonitoreoSMAP Soil Moisture Active & Passive SateliteSMOS Soil Moisture and Ocean SalinitySRB Surface Radiation BudgetSRF surfaceTMPA TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation AnalysisTOA top of the atmosphereTOVS Television-Infrared Observation Satellite (TIROS) Operational Vertical SounderTRMM Tropical Rainfall Measuring MissionWEC water and energy cycleWGNE Working Group on Numerical ExperimentationXCAL Cross-Calibration working group