Don't forget that submissions close on 13 January, 2016. We would be delighted if many of you choose to submit an abstract to this session!
Modelling climate impacts: Intercomparison, validation, and improvement of impact models
For a balanced risk assessment of climate change, understanding and
quantifying the impacts of climate change on human and natural systems
is crucial. A range of advanced numerical models are available to
simulate the response of agriculture, natural vegetation, hydrology, and
other parts of the human environment and economy to global climate
change. However, climate impact projections can diverge substantially
between different impact models, reflecting uncertainty in model
structure and parameters. Together with further layers of uncertainty
e.g. in the climate and socio-economic spheres, this impedes reliable
estimates of the costs and damages expected at different levels of
global warming.
To make impact projections more robust, it is
important to systematically validate the models in the context of the
most important types of impacts, and, if necessary, improve the
representation of the related processes. For example, evaluating and
improving the models’ response to extreme climate and weather events is a
key challenge, because of the damage these events entail and because
they are expected to get more frequent, widespread, and/or severe with
each additional degree of global warming. Comparison of multiple models
can help identify the processes that govern the response to extreme
events and highlight opportunities for model improvement.
This
session welcomes contributions that focus on evaluating
state-of-the-art climate impact simulations, assessing their fidelity
with regard to past and/or future extreme events or other relevant
features, and/or further advancing existing modelling techniques.
Contributions based on multi-model comparison projects such as the
Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP), the Inter-Sectoral Impact
Model Intercomparison Project (ISI-MIP), or the Agricultural Model
Improvement and Intercomparison Project (AgMIP) are encouraged.
