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Analysis of the CMIP data allows for
- improving understanding of
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- the climate, including its variability and change,
- improving understanding of the societal and environmental implications of climate change in terms of impacts, adaptation and vulnerability,
- informing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.
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The sixth phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6) consists of 134 models from fifty-one 51 modelling centers (Durack, 2020). CMIP6 data publication began in 2019 and the majority of the data publication will be completed by 2022. The scientific analyses from CMIP6 will be used extensively in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 6th Assessment Report (AR6), due for release in 2021/22 (IPCC, 2020).
CMIP6 will aim aims to address 3 main questions:
- How does the Earth system respond to forcing?
- What are the origins and consequences of systematic model biases?
- How can we assess future climate changes given internal climate variability, predictability, and uncertainties in scenarios ? (Eyring et al, 2016)?
There are some differences between the experimental design and organisation of CMIP6 and its predecessor CMIP5. It was decided that for CMIP6, a new and more federated structure would be used, consisting of the following three major elements:
- A handful of common experiments, the DECK (Diagnostic, Evaluation and Characterization of Klima) and CMIP historical simulations (1850 – near-present) that will maintain continuity and help document basic characteristics of models across different phases of CMIP;
- Common standards, coordination, infrastructure and documentation that will facilitate the distribution of model outputs and the characterization of the model ensemble;
- An ensemble of CMIP-Endorsed Model Intercomparison Projects (MIPs) that will be specific to a particular phase of CMIP (now CMIP6) and that will build on the DECK and CMIP historical simulations to address a large range of specific questions and fill the scientific gaps of the previous CMIP phases (World Climate Research Programme, 2020).
The CMIP6 data archive is distributed through the Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) though many national centres have either a full or partial copy of the data. A quality-controlled subset of CMIP6 data are made available through the Climate Data Store (CDS) for the users of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S).
Global climate projections in the CDS
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