Climate Model Ensembles: Why they are complicated, valuable, and fascinating, Dr. Ben Brown-Steiner

In this virtual workshop, Dr. Brown-Steiner will present an overview of climate model ensembles, including how they are configured, the value of different forms of ensembles, and the challenges associated with running, analyzing, interpreting, and discussing ensemble results. Large ensembles of climate models are used to compare and gain confidence between different climate models as well as explore uncertainties and potential pathways within an individual climate model. Gaining confidence in climate models, especially when looking at future projections, is a difficult and requires careful considerations of uncertainty, truth, and ignorance. This workshop will explore some of these issues.

Participants will also run their own "toy" climate models in an ensemble framework and we will collectively summarize, compare, discuss, and interpret our toy model results. This activity is intended to give an intuitive understanding of climate model comparisons, the difficulties that arise when discussion different model results and the different forms of uncertainty embedded within these discussions, and the balance between clear communication and jargon-laden technical details.

This virtual workshop will include short presentations, interactive components, and group discussion, with ample opportunity for questions.