TRR 181:  Energy transfers in Atmosphere and Ocean

• Subject Area: Geosciences ; Mathematics
• Term: since 2016
• Website: Homepage
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 274762653

The current climate models feature severe biases in simulating the present climate, which also do not resolve in the recent very high-resolution coupled climate simulations. These biases come along with energetic inconsistencies – with an error equivalent in magnitude to the energy imbalance of the Earth climate system due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions -- generated by energetically inconsistent parameterisations of unresolved processes and the model's numerics. Since these biases and inconsistencies limit the model's ability to predict climate, this CRC aims to resolve these shortcomings by developing the necessary process understanding of the energy transfers in the atmosphere and ocean to design more consistent new parameterisations; developing, testing and implementing the new parameterisations in ocean, atmosphere and coupled models; and developing numerical and mathematical methods featuring consistent energetics. This CRC assembles expertise in observational and theoretical physical oceanography and meteorology, numerical modelling, and mathematics to equip two national climate models with the best and energetically most consistent parameterisations and numerics to improve their predictive skills and reduce their biases in simulating the present climate. Successful steps towards achieving our goal of energetically consistent and improved atmosphere and ocean models have been made in the CRC. We propose to transition towards the final phase under the motto ‘from accuracy to application', by equipping the models with the new parameterisations and numerics developed during the earlier phases. Novel physical and mathematical concepts and a deeper understanding taking new important processes and the complete coupled system into account will lead in the final phase to a huge leap towards energetically consistent coupled climate models.

• DFG Programme: CRC/Transregios
• International Connection: United Kingdom

Current projects

• 01 - Dynamical systems methods and reduced models in geophysical fluid dynamics (Project Heads Gasser, Ingenuin ;  Rademacher, Jens )
• 02 - Systematic multi-scale modelling and analysis for geophysical flow (Project Heads Behrens, Jörn ;  Korn, Peter ;  Rademacher, Jens )
• 03 - Towards Consistent Subgrid Momentum Closures (Project Heads Danilov, Sergey ;  Gaßmann, Almut ;  Juricke, Stephan ;  Jäger, Janin ;  Korn, Peter ;  Oliver, Marcel )
• 05 - Reducing Spurious Dissipation and Energetic Inconsistencies in Realistic Ocean Modelling Applications (Project Heads Burchard, Hans ;  Danilov, Sergey ;  Iske, Armin ;  Klingbeil, Knut ;  Wollner, Winnifried )
• 08 - Surface Layer Energetics – The Route to Mixing (Project Heads Brüggemann, Nils ;  Burchard, Hans ;  Carpenter, Jeffrey ;  Czeschel, Lars ;  Eden, Carsten )
• 10 - Gravity Wave Parameterisation for the Atmosphere (Project Heads Achatz, Ulrich ;  Baumgarten, Gerd ;  Eden, Carsten ;  Lübken, Franz-Josef )
• 10 - Energy Fluxes at the Air-Sea Interface (Project Heads Buckley, Ph.D., Marc ;  Czeschel, Lars ;  Rung, Thomas ;  Wollner, Winnifried )
• 10 - Gravity Wave Genesis, Break-up and Dissipation (Project Heads Avila, Marc ;  Mellado, Juan Pedro ;  Rademacher, Jens )
• 11 - Observed and simulated internal tides: generation, modification by eddies, and contribution to energy budget (Project Heads Griesel, Alexa ;  Köhler, Janna ;  Mertens, Christian ;  Olbers, Dirk Jürgen ;  Rhein, Monika ;  von Storch, Jin-Song )
• 13 - Gravity Wave Parameterisation for the Ocean (Project Heads Köhler, Janna ;  Mertens, Christian ;  Olbers, Dirk Jürgen ;  Pollmann, Friederike )
• 13 - Internal Wave Energy Dissipation and Wavenumber Spectra: Adaptive Sampling in the Ocean Interior (Project Heads Bachmayer, Ph.D., Ralf ;  Walter, Maren )
• 13 - Spectral Energy Fluxes by Wave-Wave Interactions (Project Heads Eden, Carsten ;  Olbers, Dirk Jürgen ;  Stephan, Claudia Christine ;  Zagar, Ph.D., Nedjeljka )
• 15 - Quantifying dynamical regimes in the ocean and the atmosphere (Project Heads Chouksey, Manita ;  Oliver, Marcel ;  von Storch, Jin-Song ;  Vasylkevych, Ph.D., Sergiy ;  Zagar, Ph.D., Nedjeljka )
• 16 - Meso- to Submesoscale Turbulence in the Ocean (Project Heads Griesel, Alexa ;  Keßeböhmer, Marc ;  Walter, Maren )
• 16 - Multiscale Ocean-Atmosphere Coupling (Project Heads Brüggemann, Nils ;  Hohenegger, Cathy ;  Juricke, Stephan ;  Umlauf, Lars )
• 16 - Future Climate Applications of Mixing Parameterisations in Earth-System Models (Project Heads Griesel, Alexa ;  Paul, André ;  Pollmann, Friederike ;  Schulz, Michael )
• 17 - Diagnosis and Metrics in Climate Models (Project Heads Burchard, Hans ;  Eyring, Veronika ;  Jung, Thomas ;  Losch, Ph.D., Martin ;  Rademacher, Jens ;  Stevens, Bjorn ;  Zagar, Ph.D., Nedjeljka )
• 18 - Improved Parameterisations and Numerics in Climate Models (Project Heads Achatz, Ulrich ;  Brüggemann, Nils ;  Czeschel, Lars ;  Danilov, Sergey ;  Dobrynin, Mikhail ;  Eden, Carsten ;  Jungclaus, Johann ;  Korn, Peter ;  Schaefer-Rolffs, Urs )
• 18 - Climate Model Intercomparison (Project Heads Pollmann, Friederike ;  Weigel, Katja )
• 19 - Central administrative project (Project Head Eden, Carsten )
• 19 - Research training group (Project Heads Eden, Carsten ;  Köhler, Janna ;  Pohl, Anke ;  Pollmann, Friederike ;  Rademacher, Jens ;  Walter, Maren ;  Zagar, Ph.D., Nedjeljka )
• 19 - Outreach project (Project Heads Eden, Carsten ;  Zagar, Ph.D., Nedjeljka )

Completed projects

• 04 - Entropy production in turbulence parameterisations (Project Heads Blender, Richard ;  Gaßmann, Almut ;  Lucarini, Valerio )
• 06 - Techniques for atmosphere-ocean wave coupling (Project Heads Carpenter, Jeffrey ;  Hinze, Michael )
• 07 - Mesoscale energy cascades in the lower and middle atmosphere (Project Heads Becker, Erich ;  Gaßmann, Almut ;  Lübken, Franz-Josef )
• 07 - Dynamics of geophysical problems in turbulent regimes (Project Heads Nobili, Camilla ;  Rademacher, Jens )
• 09 - Energy transfers in gravity currents (Project Heads Kanzow, Ph.D., Torsten ;  Losch, Ph.D., Martin ;  Pollmann, Friederike )

• Applicant Institution: Universität Hamburg
• Co-Applicant Institution: Universität Bremen
• Participating University: Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main; Katholische Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt; Technische Universität Hamburg
• Participating Institution: Alfred-Wegener-Institut; Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung; GEOMAR Helmholtz-Zentrum für Ozeanforschung Kiel; Helmholtz-Zentrum hereon GmbH; Leibniz-Institut für Atmosphärenphysik an der Universität Rostock (IAP); Leibniz-Institut für Ostseeforschung Warnemünde (IOW); Max-Planck-Institut für Meteorologie (MPI-M); Deutscher Wetterdienst (DWD); Niederlassung Hamburg
• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Carsten Eden