GEMCLIM model output

All model data output is written in RPN standard files.

There are different types of model data output:
See the variable dictionaries at the end of this page.

The model will also save these other files:

These file are stored in 'machine:directory' as specified by 'CLIMAT_arch_mach' and 'CLIMAT_archdir' in the file 'configexp.dot.cfg'.
The files are organized into the following subdirectories:


 Samples
 :
 Original model output; one subdirectory per month 
    
 Diagnostics  
 :  
 Monthly diagnostics; 1 CMC-archive per month

Pilots
 :
 Monthly pilot files; 1 CMC-archive per month

Analysis
 :
 Analysis files; 1 RPN standard file per time step

Restarts
 :
 Restart files; 1 gzipped CMC-archive per job

Listings
 :
 Listings from all machines; 1 *.zip file per job

Jobs
 :
 At runtime created jobs/scripts; 1 *.zip file per job


2-D and 3-D output

There are four types of output files:

     dm   :   dynamics on model levels

dp
 :
 dynamics on pressure levels

pm
 :
 physics on model levels

pp
 :
 physics on pressure levels


And there are two stages of model output:

Direct model output
All fields requested in 'outcfg.out' are written into the four types of output files.

The general fields saved in recent runs can be found here.


Diagnostics
If 'CLIMAT_diagnos=1' in 'configexp.dot.cfg' the model output will get further processed.
The diagnostics contain:
The diagnostic files will get archived in an CMC-archive: diag_results_${exp}.ca


Variable dictionaries

At the beginning of each model listing you find a list of all fields from the physics which are available for output. You will find there the name of each variable as used in the code and the name as used in the FST output files, as well as a brief description and its position and length in the internal model data bus. Note that this list varies depending on the schemes used! Here is an example of some physics fields available for output when using ISBA.

Here are some physics tendency fields.

And here are some radiation and cloud related fields.

Again in the model listing and just after the physics variable list, there is a list of the dynamic fields available for output, but unfortunately without description. Here is a list with the most common dynamic variables:

TT
 Air temperature
2m temperature at level '1hy' resp. '1sg'
 C
UU
 u-component of the wind
10m u-component of the wind at level '1hy' resp. '1sg' 		knots
VV
 v-component of the wind
10m v-component of the wind at level '1hy' resp. '1sg'
 knots
WW
 Vertical momentum Pa/s
UV
 Wind modulus
 knots
GZ
 Geopotential height
 dam
HU
 Specific humidity
2m specific humidity at level '1hy' resp. '1sg' 		kg/kg
HR
 Relative humidity
2m relative humidity at level '1hy' resp. '1sg' 		%
ES
 Dew point depression
 C
P0
 Surface pressure
 hPa
PN
 Sea level pressure
 hPa
ME
 Mountain height
 m
LA
 Geographical latitude
 deg
LO
 Geographical longitude
 deg



Most common physics fields:

USGW GWD induced surface u-stress N/m2
VSGW GWD induced surface v-stress N/m2
AR Avg. of EI (outgoing IR energy flux at model lid) W/m2
AB Avg. of IV (incoming solar flux at model lid) W/m2
AU Avg. of EV (outgoing visible energy flux at model lid) W/m2
AD Avg. of FI (IR energy flux towards ground) W/m2
AS Avg. of FS (vis. flux absorbed by ground) W/m2
NF Avg. of NT (2-dim cloud cover) 0-1
A1 Avg. of convective liquid precipitation m/s
A2 Avg. of stratiform liquid precipitation m/s
A3 Avg. of convective solid precipitation m/s
A4 Avg. of stratiform solid precipitation m/s
A8 Avg. of liquid shallow convective precipitation m/s
A9 Avg. of solid shallow convective precipitation m/s
AE Avg. of stratiform precipitation m/s
FR Avg. of freezing precipitation m/s
PC Avg. of convective precipitation m/s
PE Avg. of frozen precipitation m/s
PR Avg. of total precipitation (= RN+SN = PC+AE)
 m/s
RN Avg. of liquid precipitation m/s
SN Avg. of snow precipitation m/s
RC Implicit precipitation rate
 m/s
RT Total precipitation rate
 m/s
AH Avg. of FC (upward surface sensible heat flux) W/m2
AG Avg. heat flux in soil W/m2
AV Avg. of FV (surface latent heat flux) W/m2
AI Avg. of SI (Net IR energy flux at the surface) W/m2
AW Avg. of FQ (surf. momentum flux) N/m2
FQ Surface momentum flux
 N/m2
S7 Avg. of u-stress N/m2
S8 Avg. of v-stress N/m2
N0 Avg. of soil surface runoff mm/s
O1 Avg. of soil base drainage mm/s
TRAF Avg. of surface runoff for all surface types + agg mm/s
TDRA
 Avg. of base drainage for all surface types + agg mm/s
N2 Avg. of liquid precip. (ISBA) m/s
N3 Avg. of solid precip. m/s
N4 Avg. of FB (downward solar flux at surface) W/m2
O5 Avg. of bare ground latent heat flux W/m2
O6 Avg. of latent heat flux from leaves W/m2
O7 Avg. of sublimation from snow m/s of water
O8 Avg. of vegetation transpiration kg/m2
O9 Avg. of evaporation from vegetation kg/m2
I0 Surface and soil temperatures K
I1 Soil volumetric water contents m3/m3
I7 Sea ice temperature K
I8 Sea ice thickness m
I9 Glacier temperature K
GL Ice fraction 0-1
GY Sea ice fraction (unmodified) 0-1
SD Snow depth cm
AL Visible surface albedo 0-1
TM Sea temperature K
J8 Area-averaged surface temperature K
FC Upward surface sensible heat flux W/m2
FV Upward surface latent heat flux W/m2
FS Solar flux absorbed at surface W/m2
FB Downward solar flux W/m2
IV Incoming solar radiation at model top W/m2
SI Net infrared flux at the surface (+ downward) W/m2
FI Surface incoming infrared flux W/m2
EI Outgoing infrared energy exiting the atmosphere W/m2
TG Radiative surface temperature K
MG Land-sea mask
 0-1
K2 Avg. of kshal counter
 0-1
DN Snow density
 kg/m3
I2 Soil volumetric ice contents
 m3/m3
I3 Water retained on the vegetation
 kg/m2
I4 Water in the snow pack
 kg/m2
I6 Albedo of snow
 0-1
HRMX Screen max. relative humidity
 0-1
HRMN Screen min. relative humidity 0-1
QSAV Screen specific humidity average
 kg/kg
IMAV Integrated soil moisture average
 kg/m2
P0AV Surface pressure average
 Pa
UVAV Screen wind modulus average
 m/s
UVMX Screen max wind modulus
 m/s
H Height of boundary layer
 m
IE Integrated cloud water/ice
 mm
IH Integrated water vapor
 mm
II Integrated ice water
 mm
IWVM Integrated water vapor avge over last moyhr hours
 kg/m2
ICRM Total LWP for rad avge over last moyhr hours
 kg/m2
IIRM Total IWP for rad avge over last moyhr hours
 kg/m2
ACLB Avg. of net clear sky lw flux at the surface
 W/m2
ACLT Avg. of net clear sky lw flux at the top
 W/m2
ACSB Avg. of net clear sky solar flux at the surface
 W/m2
ACST Avg. of net clear sky solar flux at the top
 W/m2
T5 Min. temperature over the last moyhr hours K
T9 Max. temperature over the last moyhr hours K
KEHM Total kinetic energy (per unit area) calculated on hybryd levels J/m2
TTHM Temperature (mass-weighted vertically average) calculated on hybryd levels K
AMHM Total relative angular momentum (per unit area) calculated on hybryd levels kg/s
UG
 GWD u tend. avge over the last moyhr hours m/s2
V6
 GWD v tend. avge over the last moyhr hours m/s2
X2
 u dif. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours m/s2
X3
 v dif. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours m/s2
UQVA Vertically averaged u-wind * specific humidity
 m/s kg/kg
VQVA Vertically averaged v-wind * specific humidity
 m/s kg/kg
UTVA Vertically averaged u-wind * temperature
 K m/s
VTVA Vertically averaged v-wind * temperature K m/s
CA Total clouds avge over the last moyhr hours %
CLDR
 Total clouds for rad average over last moyhr hours
 %
IWCR Cloud ice water for rad average over last moyhr hours
 kg/kg
LWCR Cloud liquid water for rad average over last moyhr hours
 kg/kg
T6 T2 (vis. heating rate interpo.from T20) avge over the last moyhr hours K/s
T7 TI (IR heating rate) avge over the last moyhr hrs K/s
W5
 QC (liquid and solid water in the atmosphere) strat. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours
 (kg/kg)/s
W6 t conv. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours K/s
W7 t strat. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours K/s
W8 HU conv. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours (kg/kg)/s
W9 HU strat. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours (kg/kg)/s
X1
 QC (liquid and solid water in the atmosphere) conv. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours
 (kg/kg)/s
X4 HU dif. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours (kg/kg)/s
X5 t dif. tend. avge over the last moyhr hours K/s
X6
 Avg. T tendency shallow conv. over the last moyhr hours K/s
X7
 Avg. HU tendency shallow conv. over the last moyhr hours
 (kg/kg)/s
Y1
 Cloud liquid (and ice) water content avge
kg/kg
Y2
 Cloud ice water content avge kg/kg


Please note that there also is a tool called r.dict that can be used to consult the official CMC-RPN variable dictionary. But be careful, the physic variables are not always correct!!!
Usage:

  r.dict -n variable_name


Pilot files

Pilot files are files which can be used to pilot a LAM run.
They can be saved during any model run to pilot another LAM run with them later.

Listings

While model and jobs are running, their listings get written in the 'listings'-directory:
  ${HOME}/listings/machine_name
At the end of each job the listings from the entry, the model and all scripts get zipped and transfered to CLIMAT_arch_mach in CLIMAT_archdir as specified in your 'configexp.dot.cfg'.

Restart files

At the end of each job, a restart file gets written. This contains the physics and dynamics files needed to restart the model. By default there will be files for each tile. These files contain a copy of the atmosphere and soil fields at the last time step of the job. When the next month gets started it reads the restart files of the previous month and continues from there. After the new month has started, the restart files from the previous month get archived on CLIMAT_arch_mach in CLIMAT_archdir as specified in your 'configexp.dot.cfg'. It is always possible to restart the model at any given month from a restart file.

Since the restart files contain a full copy of the model atmosphere and soil they are quite large. So usually we do not keep all of them but erase some by hand afterwards. The restart files get archived in an CMC-archive and gzipped afterwards. The name of a restart file looks like this:

  ${exp}step#.ca.gz

If a restart file would get larger than 2 GByte the restarts for each tile will get saved separately:

  ${exp}step#_xx-yy.ca.gz

When a run is finished, the last restart file also gets archived, but a copy of it stays in the directory in which we were running the model (~/MODEL_EXEC_RUN/${mach}).

Jobs

During a run, several jobs get created and submitted automatically. A copy of the most important jobs gets saved, zipped and transfered to CLIMAT_arch_mach in CLIMAT_archdir as specified in your 'configexp.dot.cfg'.




Author: Katja Winger
Last update: July 2012