Bias-Corrected CMIP5 CESM Data in WRF/MPAS Intermediate File Format

This technical note describes the generation of global bias corrected climate model output files from version 1 of NCAR's Community Earth System Model (CESM; Hurrell et al. 2013) that participated in phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Experiment (CMIP5), which supported the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fifth Assessment Report (IPCC AR5). The dataset contains all the variables needed for the initial and boundary conditions for simulations with the Weather Research and Forecasting model (WRF; Skamarock et al. 2008) or the Model for Prediction Across Scales (MPAS; Ringler et al. 2008, Thuburn et al. 2009, and Skamarock et al. 2012), provided in the Intermediate File Format specific to WRF and MPAS.

The data are interpolated to 26 pressure levels, have a horizontal resolution of approximately 1°, and are provided in files at six hourly intervals. The variables have been bias corrected using the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Interim Reanalysis (ERA-Interim; Simmons et al. 2006 and Dee et al. 2011) fields for 1981-2005, following the method in Bruyère et al. (2014). Files are available for a 20th Century simulation (1951-2005) and three concomitant Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) future scenarios (RCP4.5, RCP6.0 and RCP8.5) spanning 2006-2100, and are freely available from Monaghan et al. (2014).