INFERNO: a fire and emissions scheme for the UK Met Office's Unified Model
Warm and dry climatological conditions favour the occurrence of forest fires. These fires then become a significant emission source to the atmosphere. Despite this global importance, fires are a local phenomenon and are difficult to represent in large-scale Earth system models (ESMs). To address thi...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2016-08-01
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| Series: | Geoscientific Model Development |
| Online Access: | http://www.geosci-model-dev.net/9/2685/2016/gmd-9-2685-2016.pdf |
| Summary: | Warm and dry climatological conditions favour the occurrence of forest fires.
These fires then become a significant emission source to the atmosphere.
Despite this global importance, fires are a local phenomenon and are
difficult to represent in large-scale Earth system models (ESMs). To address
this, the INteractive Fire and Emission algoRithm for Natural envirOnments
(INFERNO) was developed. INFERNO follows a reduced complexity approach and is
intended for decadal- to centennial-scale climate simulations and assessment
models for policy making. Fuel flammability is simulated using temperature,
relative humidity (RH) and fuel load as well as precipitation and soil
moisture. Combining flammability with ignitions and vegetation, the burnt
area is diagnosed. Emissions of carbon and key species are estimated using
the carbon scheme in the Joint UK Land Environment Simulator (JULES) land
surface model. JULES also possesses fire index diagnostics, which we document
and compare with our fire scheme. We found INFERNO captured global burnt area
variability better than individual indices, and these performed best for
their native regions. Two meteorology data sets and three ignition modes are
used to validate the model. INFERNO is shown to effectively diagnose global
fire occurrence (<i>R</i> = 0.66) and emissions (<i>R</i> = 0.59) through an approach
appropriate to the complexity of an ESM, although regional biases remain. |
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| ISSN: | 1991-959X 1991-9603 |