[Wrf-users] SST/sea ice/albedo/vegetation updates for nests in WRFV3

[Eric Altshuler]

Hello,

I have a question about how SST/sea ice/albedo/vegetation updates are done for nests in WRFV3. Are these fields interpolated from the coarse domain to the nests, or does each nest have its own wrflowinp_d<domain> file generated by real.exe? A related question is: when running metgrid, should the start/end times for nests be set to cover the entire simulation period? Normally, when running metgrid, the ending times for nests are set to be the same as the initial time, because only the initial conditions for the nests would be used in the WRF run. However, if several "static" fields are to be updated on each nest's native grid, as opposed to interpolating these fields from the coarse domain, then it would seem necessary to generate metgrid output on the nests for the entire simulation period.

An unrelated question: when is it necessary (if ever) to run the WPS utility 'avg_tsfc.exe' to generate an average surface temperature? Since the land surface parameterization is responsible for predicting surface temperature, it seems unnecessary (and inconsistent) to specify the average surface temperature from an external source. Is this utility only used with idealized surface physics?

Thanks for your reply.

Best regards,

Eric L. Altshuler
Assistant Research Scientist
Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies
4041 Powder Mill Road, Suite 302
Calverton, MD 20705-3106
USA

E-mail: ela at cola.iges.org
Phone: (301) 902-1257
Fax: (301) 595-9793