Gustav Strandberg
Mid-Holocene climate, ca. 6 thousand years ago (6 ka), was simulated by two regional climate models (RCM) for a European domain (CORDEX EUR-44) at a grid resolution of ~50 km. The two regional models RCA4 (developed at SMHI) and HCLIM38 (developed within the HCLIM consortium) were forced by the global climate model (GCM) EC-Earth. The dataset contains selected output data from the simulations.
The 6 ka climate was simulated with different estimates of land cover: one reconstructed land cover based on pollen data, and two estimates simulated by a vegetation model. The pollen-based land cover is reconstructed using the REVEALS model (a model to estimate vegetation from pollen data), statistical analysis and a dataset for estimated past anthropogenic land use (KK10). The RCMs were also run with two different simulations of potential land cover from a dynamical vegetation model (LPJ-GUESS). This gives six simulations of mid-Holocene climate, three with each RCM. In addition, pre-industrial (PI) climate is simulated.
The results can be used as a description of mid-Holocene climate. The PI simulations can be used as reference. The simulations can also be used to study the effect of anthropogenic land-cover changes, comparing simulations using potential land cover with simulations using reconstructed land cover. Furthermore, the simulations can be used to estimate the sensitivity of the RCMs to differences in land cover, comparing simulations using different potential land cover.
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Citation
Gustav Strandberg (2022) Mid-Holocene climate in Europe simulated with two regional climate models using pollen-based and simulated land cover. Dataset version 1. Bolin Centre Database. https://doi.org/10.17043/strandberg-2022-landclim-ii-1
References
Strandberg G, Lindström J, Poska A, Zhang Q, Fyfe R, Githumbi E, Kjellström E, Mazier F, Nielsen AB, Sugita S, Trondman A-K, Woodbridge J, Gaillard M-J (2022): Mid-Holocene European climate revisited: New high-resolution regional climate model simulations using pollen-based land-cover. Quaternary Science Reviews 281:107431. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2022.107431
Data description
The dataset contains RCM results from the LandClim II project presented in the study by Strandberg et al. (2022).
Time periods: PI (30 year time slice) and 6 ka (50 year time slice)
RCMs: RCA4, HCLIM38
Domain: Europe (CORDEX EUR-44, ~50 km)
Driving GCM: EC-Earth
For 6 ka both RCMs are run with three different land covers:
- 6k-1: LPJ-GUESS potential land cover based on RCA4 climate.
- 6k-2: LPJ-GUESS potential land cover based on HCLIM climate.
- 6k-R: Reconstructed land cover based on REVEALS and KK10.
Available data: monthly and seasonal data for standard meteorological data such as temperature, precipitation, evapotranspiration, pressure, cloud cover.
Variables
- albl - albedo
- clt - cloud fraction
- evspsbl - evapotranspiration
- hfls - latent heat flux
- hfss - sensible heat flux
- pr - precipitation
- psl - sea level pressure
- rlds - downwards longwave radiation at surface
- rsds - downwards shortwave radiation at surface
- ta850 - temperature at 850 hPa
- ta925 - temperature at 925 hPa
- tas- temperature at 2m
- tasmax - daily maximum temperature at 2m
- tasmin - daily minimum temperature at 2m
- ts - surface temperature
File type: NetCDF-3
The dataset is divided into four folders: 6k-1, 6k-2, 6k-R, PI. Each 6k folder contains 30 nc files. The PI folder contains 29 nc files. Total file size: 3.3 GB.
Comments
The entire dataset can be downloaded in a zip file here. Individual files can also be downloaded directly from their original location at the National Supercomputer Centre (NSC), at Linköping University, both via http and rsync.
The simulations were performed at the Rossby Centre, Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI).