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An Overview of the Improving Projections of AMOC and its Collapse Through advanced Simulations (ImPACTS) project

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Abstract

The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is an essential part of the Earth System, with a northward heat transport peaking at 1 PW.  Although this rate of heat transport is smaller than atmospheric heat transport, the AMOC has a longer memory and a strong global impact.  A growing concern is the possibility of the collapse of AMOC, if certain climatic thresholds are exceeded.  A collapse of the present-day AMOC would have dramatic global impacts, including regional air temperature reductions as high as 12oC.  Current models do not agree on how close we are to the AMOC tipping point.  Assessments at low resolution may also be overly conservative due to model biases in freshwater transport into the Atlantic and no work has probed AMOC stability in depth at higher (eddy mostly resolving) resolution. E3SM has a long standing overly weak AMOC at low resolution and the high resolution model is too expensive to fully probe AMOC stability.  The main aims of the Improving Projections of AMOC and its Collapse Through advanced Simulations (ImPACTS) project seek to fill these critical gaps.  The ImPACTS project brings together ocean scientists, computational scientists, and applied mathematicians to accelerate progress in rectifying the E3SM low resolution bias and exploring new methods to accelerate high resolution spin up and model performance.  In this presentation, progress to date is summarized, including new AI capabilities for model analysis/bias and super resolution, efforts to accelerate MPAS-Ocean performance, and newly available analysis and planned simulations, including a first AMOC collapse experiment at high resolution.

Category
Impacts, Tipping Points and Systems Responses and Resilience
High Latitude
Funding Program Area(s)
Additional Resources:
NERSC (National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center)