Climate Model Summary Archive: 27 October 2010
Models predict La Niña event will persist into at least early 2011
Summary
As detailed in the ENSO Wrap-up, the La Niña event in the Pacific Ocean remains a moderate to strong event.
Dynamical models surveyed by the Bureau of Meteorology suggest central Pacific Ocean (Niño3.4) sea surface temperatures are likely to remain at levels typical of a La Niña event for the remainder of 2010, with the majority of the models indicating the event will gradually weaken during the first quarter of 2011.
The UK Met Office and NASA models predict Niño3.4 will cool further, with Nino3.4 peaking at its coolest temperature towards the end of the year. The Japanese Met Agency and NCEP models predict central Pacific Ocean temperatures will remain at similar levels through 2010, while ECMWF and the Korean Met Administration models predict the central pacific will start to warm in coming months. All models predict the central pacific will warm during the first quarter of 2011.
The Bureau's POAMA model suggests that central Pacific Ocean temperatures will start to warm in coming months, with all thirty POAMA forecasts favouring a gradual weakening of La Niña conditions. However, despite a gradual weakening, POAMA predicts that the central Pacific Ocean will remain at temperatures typical of a La Niña event until at least early 2011.
Model Outlooks
The following table summarises the opinion of National Climate Centre climatologists regarding the outputs from various long range forecast models. The model set contains eight reputable ocean or coupled ocean/atmosphere climate models that take into account complex physical ocean processes. NCC's interpretation may not necessarily be the same as the organisations producing the model output. You are therefore encouraged to follow the hyperlinks to the various institutions listed in the table.
See About ENSO outlooks for details on the models and a summary of the terms used.
MODEL / GROUP |
Forecast Start Date | 1-3 MONTHS (Nov 10 to Jan 11) |
4-6 MONTHS (Feb 11 to Apr 11) |
---|---|---|---|
POAMA Australian Bureau of Meteorology |
25 October | Cool | Cool/Neutral |
System 3 ECMWF (EU) |
1 October | Cool | Cool |
GloSea * UK Met Office |
1 October | Cool | Cool # |
CFS NCEP (US) |
26 October | Cool | Cool |
CGCMv1 NASA Goddard GMAO (US) |
1 October | Cool | Cool/Neutral |
JMA-CGCM02 Japan Met. Agency |
1 October | Cool | Cool/Neutral |
KMA-SNU Korean Met. Administration |
September | Cool/Neutral | Cool/Neutral |
BCC_CMA BCC/CMA (China) |
Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable |
# Model forecast is run only until the end of March
* Note that this page requires a password, freely available from UK Met Office
Note that some links above may be updated to more recent forecasts than
listed here.
POAMA Forecasts
The POAMA model, run at the Bureau of Meteorology, generates a new forecast every day for the following eight months starting with the latest observations. The average of the most recent 30 model runs predict La Niña conditions will gradually weaken over the coming months however the event will persist into February 2011.
A negative IOD event in the Indian Ocean continues. The latest weekly value of the IOD index is -0.54. POAMA predicts that the IOD index will remain at negative IOD levels throughout the southern hemisphere spring, but will weaken, becoming neutral in December. IOD events usually weaken during November and December with the onset of the Australian Monsoon.
February 2011
For the 30 runs of POAMA between 26 September 2010 and 25 October 2010, the average
NINO3.4 temperature anomaly for February 2011 is -0.72°C and the frequency distribution
is as follows:
below −0.8°C: 40.0% (Cool)
−0.8°C to +0.8°C: 60% (Neutral)
above +0.8°C: 0.0% (Warm)
April 2011
Similarly for March 2011 the average NINO3.4 index is -0.45°C and
the frequency distribution is:
below −0.8°C: 16.7% (Cool)
−0.8°C to +0.8°C: 83.3% (Neutral)
above +0.8°C: 0.0% (Warm)
Similar data for other months can be accessed by following the "POAMA" link in the table above.
Users should exercise caution when interpreting these forecasts and are encouraged to view the actual model outputs by following the web links. Frequent updates of the latest observational data with relevant commentary are available on the Bureau's ENSO Wrap-Up page.
This survey last updated 27th October 2010.
Next update expected 10th November 2010.