Huge Ensembles Part I: Design of Ensemble Weather Forecasts using Spherical Fourier Neural Operators

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Hauptverfasser: Mahesh, Ankur, Collins, William, Bonev, Boris, Brenowitz, Noah, Cohen, Yair, Elms, Joshua, Harrington, Peter, Kashinath, Karthik, Kurth, Thorsten, North, Joshua, OBrien, Travis, Pritchard, Michael, Pruitt, David, Risser, Mark, Subramanian, Shashank, Willard, Jared
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2024
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author Mahesh, Ankur
Collins, William
Bonev, Boris
Brenowitz, Noah
Cohen, Yair
Elms, Joshua
Harrington, Peter
Kashinath, Karthik
Kurth, Thorsten
North, Joshua
OBrien, Travis
Pritchard, Michael
Pruitt, David
Risser, Mark
Subramanian, Shashank
Willard, Jared
author_facet Mahesh, Ankur
Collins, William
Bonev, Boris
Brenowitz, Noah
Cohen, Yair
Elms, Joshua
Harrington, Peter
Kashinath, Karthik
Kurth, Thorsten
North, Joshua
OBrien, Travis
Pritchard, Michael
Pruitt, David
Risser, Mark
Subramanian, Shashank
Willard, Jared
contents Studying low-likelihood high-impact extreme weather events in a warming world is a significant and challenging task for current ensemble forecasting systems. While these systems presently use up to 100 members, larger ensembles could enrich the sampling of internal variability. They may capture the long tails associated with climate hazards better than traditional ensemble sizes. Due to computational constraints, it is infeasible to generate huge ensembles (comprised of 1,000-10,000 members) with traditional, physics-based numerical models. In this two-part paper, we replace traditional numerical simulations with machine learning (ML) to generate hindcasts of huge ensembles. In Part I, we construct an ensemble weather forecasting system based on Spherical Fourier Neural Operators (SFNO), and we discuss important design decisions for constructing such an ensemble. The ensemble represents model uncertainty through perturbed-parameter techniques, and it represents initial condition uncertainty through bred vectors, which sample the fastest growing modes of the forecast. Using the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Integrated Forecasting System (IFS) as a baseline, we develop an evaluation pipeline composed of mean, spectral, and extreme diagnostics. Using large-scale, distributed SFNOs with 1.1 billion learned parameters, we achieve calibrated probabilistic forecasts. As the trajectories of the individual members diverge, the ML ensemble mean spectra degrade with lead time, consistent with physical expectations. However, the individual ensemble members' spectra stay constant with lead time. Therefore, these members simulate realistic weather states, and the ML ensemble thus passes a crucial spectral test in the literature. The IFS and ML ensembles have similar Extreme Forecast Indices, and we show that the ML extreme weather forecasts are reliable and discriminating.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2408_03100
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Huge Ensembles Part I: Design of Ensemble Weather Forecasts using Spherical Fourier Neural Operators
Mahesh, Ankur
Collins, William
Bonev, Boris
Brenowitz, Noah
Cohen, Yair
Elms, Joshua
Harrington, Peter
Kashinath, Karthik
Kurth, Thorsten
North, Joshua
OBrien, Travis
Pritchard, Michael
Pruitt, David
Risser, Mark
Subramanian, Shashank
Willard, Jared
Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics
Machine Learning
Studying low-likelihood high-impact extreme weather events in a warming world is a significant and challenging task for current ensemble forecasting systems. While these systems presently use up to 100 members, larger ensembles could enrich the sampling of internal variability. They may capture the long tails associated with climate hazards better than traditional ensemble sizes. Due to computational constraints, it is infeasible to generate huge ensembles (comprised of 1,000-10,000 members) with traditional, physics-based numerical models. In this two-part paper, we replace traditional numerical simulations with machine learning (ML) to generate hindcasts of huge ensembles. In Part I, we construct an ensemble weather forecasting system based on Spherical Fourier Neural Operators (SFNO), and we discuss important design decisions for constructing such an ensemble. The ensemble represents model uncertainty through perturbed-parameter techniques, and it represents initial condition uncertainty through bred vectors, which sample the fastest growing modes of the forecast. Using the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Integrated Forecasting System (IFS) as a baseline, we develop an evaluation pipeline composed of mean, spectral, and extreme diagnostics. Using large-scale, distributed SFNOs with 1.1 billion learned parameters, we achieve calibrated probabilistic forecasts. As the trajectories of the individual members diverge, the ML ensemble mean spectra degrade with lead time, consistent with physical expectations. However, the individual ensemble members' spectra stay constant with lead time. Therefore, these members simulate realistic weather states, and the ML ensemble thus passes a crucial spectral test in the literature. The IFS and ML ensembles have similar Extreme Forecast Indices, and we show that the ML extreme weather forecasts are reliable and discriminating.
title Huge Ensembles Part I: Design of Ensemble Weather Forecasts using Spherical Fourier Neural Operators
topic Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics
Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.03100