Contribution to climate change countermeasures via development and application of climatic models

JAMSTEC is developing a global climate model (GCM) and an Earth system model (ESM, a GCM coupled with biogeochemical models) and participating in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6, designed to contribute to the 6th Assessment Report of IPCC)(started FY2018). In addition, we will conduct analyses using the model outputs and contribute to the realization of the Paris Agreement, and thus SDG 13. More specifically, we will carry out climate change projection experiments, compare their outputs with observational data, and factor analyses of environmental change including interaction with the socio-economic system. Furthermore, by summarizing these data as scientific knowledge and providing the data as spatio-temporal information, we will contribute to mitigation policy development.
For this purpose, by FY2021, we will develop a fine spatial resolution version of the ESM, and in combination with seasonal projection models, improve the predictability of climate change and decadal variability of which the ocean plays an important role.
Meanwhile, we will also investigate future climate change by using the fine-resolution cloud resolving climate model NICAM. Using this model, we will contribute to IPCC, WCRP, and the world model development community by providing the output of global cloud-resolving simulation to IPCC, further understanding future changes in cloud/ rainfall/atmospheric circulation, and evaluation of uncertainty in climate sensitivity related to detailed cloud microphysics.

Schematic diagram of the grid-system of an Earth system model
Schematic diagram of the modeled processes in an Earth system model
Cloud-resolving climatic simulation

Research Institute for Global Change (RIGC)
Research Center for Environmental Modeling and Application (CEMA)