Impact of Increased Vertical Resolution on Medium-Range Forecasts in a Global Atmospheric Model

Abstract

Abstract This study aims to investigate the impact of increased vertical resolution on global medium-range forecasts. For this purpose, the dependencies of simulated atmospheric temperature and specific humidity on the lowest model level height and vertical grid spacing are investigated. The reduced first model level increases vertical turbulent mixing by determining a higher planetary boundary layer (PBL) height and associated turbulent diffusivities and velocity scales. This contributes to warming/drying within the PBL and cooling/moistening above the PBL. Resulting dryness near the surface enhances an increase in surface moisture flux from the ocean, which results in the apparent moistening of the troposphere. Consequently, large-scale precipitation increases due to more humid atmospheric conditions, while convective precipitation decreases because of drier conditions near the starting level of convection. Meanwhile, the reduced vertical grid spacing resolves the overshooting layer well in the cumulus convection process, which decreases the detrained moisture at the convective cloud top. This leads to a noticeable downward shift of ice clouds in the upper troposphere, and further contributes to the enhancement of longwave cooling via cloud–radiation processes. In medium-range forecasts, the increased vertical resolution exerts a significant impact on the simulated features of tropospheric temperature and humidity, while changes in the prediction accuracy precipitation are negligible owing to compensation between convective and large-scale precipitation. Finally, the discussion of possible methods to minimize the sensitivities of model’s physics to vertical resolution is presented.