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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 433 records · Page 24
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

Sensitivity of Surface Temperature to Oceanic Forcing via q -Flux Green’s Function Experiments. Part I: Linear Response Function

This paper explores the use of the linear response function (LRF) to relate the mean sea surface temperature (SST) response to prescribed ocean heat convergence ( q flux) forcings. Two methods for constructing the LRF based on the fluctuation–dissipation theorem (FDT) and Green’s function (GRF) are examined. A 900-yr preindustrial simulation by the Community Earth System Model coupled with a slab ocean model (CESM–SOM) is used to estimate the LRF using FDT. For GRF, 106 pairs of CESM–SOM simulations with warm and cold q-flux patches are performed. FDT is found to have some skill in estimating the SST response to a q-flux forcing when the local SST response is strong, but it fails in inverse estimation of the q-flux forcing for a given SST pattern. In contrast, GRF is shown to be reasonably accurate in estimating both SST response and q-flux forcing. Possible degradation in FDT may be attributed to insufficient data sampling, significant departure of the SST distribution from Gaussianity, and the nonnormality of the constructed operator. The GRF-based LRF is then used to (i) generate a global surface temperature sensitivity map that shows the q-flux forcing in higher latitudes to be 3–4 times more effective than low latitudes in producing global surface warming, and (ii) identify the most excitable SST mode (neutral vector) that shows marked resemblance to the interdecadal Pacific oscillation (IPO). The latter discovery suggests that the IPO-like fluctuation exists in the absence of the coupling to the ocean dynamics. Coupling to the ocean dynamics in CESM, on the other hand, only enhances the spectral power of the IPO at interannual time scales.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Changes in Frequency of Large Precipitation Accumulations over Land in a Warming Climate from the CESM Large Ensemble: The Roles of Moisture, Circulation, and Duration

Projected changes in the frequency of major precipitation accumulations (hundreds of millimeters), integrated over rainfall events, over land in the late twenty-first century are analyzed in the Community Earth System Model (CESM) Large Ensemble, based on the RCP8.5 scenario. Accumulation sizes are sorted by the local average recurrence interval (ARI), ranging from 0.1 to 100 years, for the current and projected late-twenty-first-century climates separately. For all ARIs, the frequency of exceedance of the given accumulation size increases in the future climate almost everywhere, especially for the largest accumulations, with the 100-yr accumulation becoming about 3 times more frequent, averaged over the global land area. The moisture budget allows the impacts of individual factors—moisture, circulation, and event duration—to be isolated. In the tropics, both moisture and circulation cause large future increases, enhancing the 100-yr accumulation by 23% and 13% (average over tropical land), and are individually responsible for making the current-climate 100-yr accumulation 2.7 times and 1.8 times more frequent, but effects of shorter durations slightly offset these effects. In the midlatitudes, large accumulations become about 5% longer in duration, but are predominantly controlled by enhanced moisture, with the 100-yr accumulation (land average) becoming 2.4 times more frequent, and 2.2 times more frequent due to moisture increases alone. In some monsoon-affected regions, the 100-yr accumulation becomes more than 5 times as frequent, where circulation changes are the most impactful factor. These projections indicate that changing duration of events is a relatively minor effect on changing accumulations, their future enhancement being dominated by enhanced intensity (the combination of moisture and circulation).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Impacts of the North Atlantic Warming Hole in Future Climate Projections: Mean Atmospheric Circulation and the North Atlantic Jet

In future climate simulations there is a pronounced region of reduced warming in the subpolar gyre of the North Atlantic Ocean known as the North Atlantic warming hole (NAWH). This study investigates the impact of the North Atlantic warming hole on atmospheric circulation and midlatitude jets within the Community Earth System Model (CESM). Specifically, a series of large-ensemble atmospheric model experiments with prescribed sea surface temperature (SST) and sea ice are conducted, in which the warming hole is either filled or deepened. Two mechanisms through which the NAWH impacts the atmosphere are identified: a linear response characterized by a shallow atmospheric cooling and increase in sea level pressure shifted slightly downstream of the SST changes, and a transient eddy forced response whereby the enhanced SST gradient produced by the NAWH leads to increased transient eddy activity that propagates vertically and enhances the midlatitude jet. The relative contributions of these two mechanisms and the details of the response are strongly dependent on the season, time period, and warming hole strength. Our results indicate that the NAWH plays an important role in midlatitude atmospheric circulation changes in CESM future climate simulations.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2019

Circumglobal Response to Prescribed Soil Moisture over North America

A series of idealized prescribed soil moisture experiments is performed with the atmosphere/land stand-alone configuration of the Community Earth System Model, version 1, in an effort to find sources of predictability for high-impact stationary wave anomalies observed in recent boreal summers. We arbitrarily prescribe soil water to have a zero value at selected domains in the continental United States and run 100-member ensembles to examine the monthly and seasonal mean response. Contrary to the lack of a substantial response in the boreal winter, the summertime circulation response is robust, consistent, and circumglobal. While the stationary wave response over the North America and North Atlantic sectors can be well explained by the reaction of a linear dynamical system to heating anomalies caused by the imposed dry land surface, nonlinear processes involving synoptic eddies play a crucial role in forming the remote response in Eurasia and the North Pacific Ocean. A number of other possible factors contributing to the circulation responses are also discussed. Overall, the experiments suggest that, in the boreal summer, soil moisture may contribute to the predictability of high-impact stationary wave events, which can impact regions that are great distances from these source regions.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Cloud Radiative Feedbacks and El Niño–Southern Oscillation

Cloud radiative feedbacks are disabled via “cloud-locking” in the Community Earth System Model, version 1.2 (CESM1.2), to result in a shift in El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) periodicity from 2–7 years to decadal time scales. We hypothesize that cloud radiative feedbacks may impact the periodicity in three ways: by 1) modulating heat flux locally into the equatorial Pacific subsurface through negative shortwave cloud feedback on sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTA), 2) damping the persistence of subtropical southeast Pacific SSTA such that the South Pacific meridional mode impacts the duration of ENSO events, or 3) controlling the meridional width of off-equatorial westerly winds, which impacts the periodicity of ENSO by initiating longer Rossby waves. The result of cloud-locking in CESM1.2 contrasts that of another study, which found that cloud-locking in a different global climate model led to decreased ENSO magnitude across all time scales due to a lack of positive longwave feedback on the anomalous Walker circulation. CESM1.2 contains this positive longwave feedback on the anomalous Walker circulation, but either its influence on the surface is decoupled from ocean dynamics or the feedback is only active on interannual time scales. The roles of cloud radiative feedbacks in ENSO in other global climate models are additionally considered. In particular, it is shown that one cannot predict the role of cloud radiative feedbacks in ENSO through a multimodel diagnostic analysis. Instead, they must be directly altered.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Uncovering the Forced Climate Response from a Single Ensemble Member Using Statistical Learning

Internal atmospheric variability fundamentally limits predictability of climate and obscures evidence of anthropogenic climate change regionally and on time scales of up to a few decades. Dynamical adjustment techniques estimate and subsequently remove the influence of atmospheric circulation variability on temperature or precipitation. The residual component is expected to contain the thermodynamical signal of the externally forced response but with less circulation-induced noise. Existing techniques have led to important insights into recent trends in regional (hydro-) climate and their drivers, but the variance explained by circulation is often low. Here, we develop a novel dynamical adjustment technique by implementing principles from statistical learning. We demonstrate in an ensemble of Community Earth System Model (CESM) simulations that statistical learning methods, such as regularized linear models, establish a clearer relationship between circulation variability and atmospheric target variables, and need relatively short periods of record for training (around 30 years). The method accounts for, on average, 83% and 78% of European monthly winter temperature and precipitation variability at gridcell level, and around 80% of global mean temperature and hemispheric precipitation variability. We show that the residuals retain forced thermodynamical contributions to temperature and precipitation variability. Accurate estimates of the total forced response can thus be recovered assuming that forced circulation changes are gradual over time. Overall, forced climate response estimates can be extracted at regional or global scales from approximately 3–5 times fewer ensemble members, or even a single realization, using statistical learning techniques. We anticipate the technique will contribute to reducing uncertainties around internal variability and facilitating climate change detection and attribution.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Nonlinear Climate Responses to Increasing CO2 and Anthropogenic Aerosols Simulated by CESM1

Abstract Atmospheric CO2 and anthropogenic aerosols (AA) have increased simultaneously. Because of their opposite radiative effects, these increases may offset each other, which may lead to some nonlinear effects. Here the seasonal and regional characteristics of this nonlinear effect from the CO2 and AA forcings are investigated using the fully coupled Community Earth System Model. Results show that nonlinear effects are small in the global mean of the top-of-the-atmosphere radiative fluxes, surface air temperature, and precipitation. However, significant nonlinear effects exist over the Arctic and other extratropical regions during certain seasons. When both forcings are included, Arctic sea ice in September–November decreases less than the linear combination of the responses to the individual forcings due to a higher sea ice sensitivity to the CO2-induced warming than the sensitivity to the AA-induced cooling. This leads to less Arctic warming in the combined-forcing experiment due to reduced energy release from the Arctic Ocean to the atmosphere. Some nonlinear effects on precipitation in June–August are found over East Asia, with the northward-shifted East Asian summer rain belt to oppose the CO2 effect. In December–February, the aerosol loading over Europe in the combined-forcing experiment is higher than that due to the AA forcing, resulting from CO2-induced circulation changes. The changed aerosol loading results in regional thermal responses due to aerosol direct and indirect effects, weakening the combined changes of temperature and circulation. This study highlights the need to consider nonlinear effects from historical CO2 and AA forcings in seasonal and regional climate attribution analyses.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

Budgets for Decadal Variability in Pacific Ocean Heat Content

A slowdown in the rate of surface warming in the early 2000s led to renewed interest in the redistribution of ocean heat content (OHC) and its relationship with internal climate variability. In this work we use the Community Earth System Model version 1 to study the relationship between OHC and the interdecadal Pacific oscillation (IPO), a major mode of decadal sea surface temperature variability in the Pacific Ocean. By comparing the relative contributions of surface heat flux and ocean dynamics to changes in OHC for different phases of the IPO, we try to identify the underlying physical processes involved. Our results suggest that during IPO phase transitions, changes of 0–300-m OHC across the northern extratropical Pacific are positively contributed by both surface heat flux and oceanic heat transport. By contrast, oceanic heat transport appears to drive the OHC changes in equatorial Pacific whereas surface heat flux acts as a damping term. During a positive IPO phase, weakened wind-driven circulation acts to increase the OHC in the equatorial Pacific while the enhanced evaporation acts to damp OHC anomalies. In the Kuroshio–Oyashio Extension region, a dipole anomaly of zonal heat advection amplifies an OHC dipole anomaly that moves eastward, while strong turbulent heat fluxes act to dampen this OHC anomaly. In the northern subtropical Pacific, both the wind-driven evaporation change and the change of zonal heat advection along Kuroshio Extension contribute to the OHC change during phase transition. For the northern subpolar Pacific, both surface heat flux and enhanced meridional advection contribute to the positive OHC anomalies during the positive IPO phase.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

A Hindcast Approach to Diagnosing the Equatorial Pacific Cold Tongue SST Bias in CESM1

An ensemble seasonal hindcast approach is used to investigate the development of the equatorial Pacific Ocean cold sea surface temperature (SST) bias and its characteristic annual cycle in the Community Earth System Model, version 1 (CESM1). In observations, eastern equatorial Pacific SSTs exhibit a warm phase during boreal spring and a cold phase during late boreal summer–autumn. The CESM1 climatology shows a cold bias during both warm and cold phases. In our hindcasts, the cold bias during the cold phase develops in less than 6 months, whereas the cold bias during the warm phase takes longer to emerge. The fast-developing cold-phase cold bias is associated with too-strong vertical advection and easterly wind stress over the eastern equatorial region. The antecedent boreal summer easterly wind anomalies also appear in atmosphere-only simulations, indicating that the errors are intrinsic to the atmosphere component. For the slower-developing warm-phase cold bias, we find that the too-cold SSTs over the equatorial region are associated with a slowly evolving upward displacement of subsurface ocean zonal currents and isotherms that can be traced to the ocean component.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

Impacts of Wildfire Aerosols on Global Energy Budget and Climate: The Role of Climate Feedbacks

Aerosols emitted from wildfires could significantly affect global climate through perturbing global radiation balance. In this study, the Community Earth System Model with prescribed daily fire aerosol emissions is used to investigate fire aerosols’ impacts on global climate with emphasis on the role of climate feedbacks. The total global fire aerosol radiative effect (RE) is estimated to be -0.78 ± 0.29 W m -2 , which is mostly from shortwave RE due to aerosol–cloud interactions (REaci; -0.70 ± 0.20 W m -2 ). The associated global annual-mean surface air temperature (SAT) change ΔT is -0.64 ± 0.16 K with the largest reduction in the Arctic regions where the shortwave REaci is strong. Associated with the cooling, the Arctic sea ice is increased, which acts to reamplify the Arctic cooling through a positive ice-albedo feedback. The fast response (irrelevant to ΔT) tends to decrease surface latent heat flux into atmosphere in the tropics to balance strong atmospheric fire black carbon absorption, which reduces the precipitation in the tropical land regions (southern Africa and South America). The climate feedback processes (associated with ΔT) lead to a significant surface latent heat flux reduction over global ocean areas, which could explain most (~80%) of the global precipitation reduction. The precipitation significantly decreases in deep tropical regions (5°N) but increases in the Southern Hemisphere tropical ocean, which is associated with the southward shift of the intertropical convergence zone and the weakening of Southern Hemisphere Hadley cell. Such changes could partly compensate the interhemispheric temperature asymmetry induced by boreal forest fire aerosol indirect effects, through intensifying the cross-equator atmospheric heat transport.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

Role of Tropical Variability in Driving Decadal Shifts in the Southern Hemisphere Summertime Eddy-Driven Jet

The Southern Hemisphere summertime eddy-driven jet and storm tracks have shifted poleward over the recent few decades. In previous studies, explanations have mainly stressed the influence of external forcing in driving this trend. Here we examine the role of internal tropical SST variability in controlling the austral summer jet’s poleward migration, with a focus on interdecadal time scales. The role of external forcing and internal variability are isolated by using a hierarchy of Community Earth System Model version 1 (CESM1) simulations, including the pre-industrial control, large ensemble, and pacemaker runs. Model simulations suggest that in the early twenty-first century, both external forcing and internal tropical Pacific SST variability are important in driving a positive southern annular mode (SAM) phase and a poleward migration of the eddy-driven jet. Tropical Pacific SST variability, associated with the negative phase of the interdecadal Pacific oscillation (IPO), acts to shift the jet poleward over the southern Indian and southwestern Pacific Oceans and intensify the jet in the southeastern Pacific basin, while external forcing drives a significant poleward jet shift in the South Atlantic basin. In response to both external forcing and decadal Pacific SST variability, the transient eddy momentum flux convergence belt in the middle latitudes experiences a poleward migration due to the enhanced meridional temperature gradient, leading to a zonally symmetric southward migration of the eddy-driven jet. This mechanism distinguishes the influence of the IPO on the midlatitude circulation from the dynamical impact of ENSO, with the latter mainly promoting the subtropical wave-breaking critical latitude poleward and pushing the midlatitude jet to higher latitudes.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

Projected End-of-Century Changes in the South American Monsoon in the CESM Large Ensemble

Projected changes in the South American monsoon system by the end of the twenty-first century are analyzed using the Community Earth System Model Large Ensemble (CESM-LENS). The wet season is shorter in LENS when compared to observations, with the mean onset occurring 19 days later and the mean retreat date 21 days earlier in the season. Despite a precipitation bias, the seasonality of rainfall over South America is reproduced in LENS, as well as the main circulation features associated with the development of the South American monsoon. Both the onset and retreat of the wet season over South America are delayed in the future compared to current climate by 3 and 7 days, respectively, with a slightly longer wet season. Central and southeastern Brazil are projected to get wetter as a result of moisture convergence from the strengthening of the South Atlantic low-level jet and a weaker South Atlantic subtropical high. The Amazon is projected to get drier by the end of the century, negatively affecting rain forest productivity. During the wet season, an increase in the frequency and intensity of extreme precipitation events is found over most of South America, and especially over northeastern and southern Brazil and La Plata. Meanwhile, during the dry season an increase in the maximum number of consecutive dry days is found over northeastern Brazil and the northern Amazon.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Deforestation strengthens atmospheric transport of mineral dust and phosphorus from North Africa to the Amazon

Phosphorus contained in atmospheric mineral dust aerosol originating from Africa fertilizes tropical forests in Amazonia. However, the mechanisms influencing this nutrient transport pathway remain poorly understood. Here we use the Community Earth System Model to investigate how large-scale deforestation affects mineral dust aerosol transport and deposition in the tropics. We find that the surface biophysical changes that accompany deforestation produce a warmer, drier and windier surface environment that perturbs atmospheric circulation and enhances long-range dust transport from North Africa to the Amazon. Tropics-wide deforestation weakens the Hadley circulation, which in turn, leads to a northward expansion of the Hadley cell and increases surface air pressure over the Sahara Desert. Additionally, the high pressure anomaly over the Sahara, in turn, increases northeasterly winds across North Africa and the tropical North Atlantic Ocean, which subsequently increases dust transport to the South America continent. We estimate that the annual atmospheric phosphorus deposition from dust significantly increases by 27% (P < 0.01) in the Amazon under a scenario of complete deforestation. These interactions exemplify how land surface changes can modify tropical nutrient cycling, which in turn, may have consequences for long-term changes in tropical ecosystem productivity and biodiversity.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2023

Biomass Burning Emissions of Black Carbon over the Maritime Continent and ENSO Variability

Fire emissions from the Maritime Continent (MC) over the western tropical Pacific are strongly influenced by El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), posing various climate effects to the Earth system. Here, in this study, we show that the historical biomass burning emissions of black carbon (BC bb ) aerosol in the dry season from the MC are strengthened in El Niño years due to the dry conditions. The eastern Pacific type of El Niño exerts a stronger modulation in BC bb emissions over the MC region than the central Pacific type of El Niño. Based on simulations using the fully coupled Community Earth System Model (CESM), the impacts of increased BC bb emissions on ENSO variability and frequency are also investigated in this study. With BC bb emissions from the MC scaled up by a factor of 10, which enables the identification of climate response from the internal variability, the increased BC bb heats the local atmosphere and changes land–sea thermal contrast, which suppresses the westward transport of the eastern Pacific surface water. It leads to an increase in sea surface temperature in the eastern tropical Pacific, which further enhances ENSO variability and increases the frequency of extreme El Niño and La Niña events. This study highlights the potential role of BC bb emissions on extreme ENSO frequency, and this role may be increasingly important in the warming future with higher wildfire risks.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

Fast Response of East Asian Precipitation in June 2020 to Local and Remote Aerosol Emission Reductions during COVID-19

Here, in this study, the fast response of East Asian summer precipitation to COVID-19–induced aerosol emission reductions is examined using the Community Earth System Model, version 2.2 (CESM2.2). The emission reductions decreased aerosol optical depth and cloud cover over northern China in June 2020. The troposphere became warmer, strengthening the land–sea thermal contrast and anomalous southerly winds. The subtropical westerly jet accelerated and shifted southward, favoring low-level convergence, upward air motions, and subsequent condensational heating over the Yangtze River basin (YRB). The feedback of condensational heating in return strengthened the convergence and ascent. The western North Pacific subtropical high was intensified, which further enhanced the moisture advection and convergence over the YRB. Both the enhanced moisture convergence and ascent increased precipitation over the YRB during June 2020. Furthermore, local and remote emission reductions show different impacts on convection and moisture transport over the YRB. The emission reductions over China caused stronger convective precipitation (1.15 vs 0.63 mm day −1 ) but weaker larger-scale precipitation (1.17 vs 2.24 mm day −1 ) than the emission reductions outside China. In addition to the emission reductions, the sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in 2020 also play an important role in increasing precipitation over the YRB, contributing about 42.8%. The relative contribution of SST anomalies also increases under the COVID-19–induced emission scenario.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

The QBO–MJO Connection: A Possible Role for the SST and ENSO

We examine the hypothesis that the observed connection between the stratospheric quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) and the strength of the Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO) is modulated by the sea surface temperature (SST)—for example, by El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). A composite analysis shows that, globally, La Niña SSTs are remarkably similar to those that occur during the easterly phase of the QBO. A maximum covariance analysis suggests that MJO power and SST are strongly linked on both the ENSO time scale and the QBO time scale. We analyze simulations with a modified configuration of version 2 of the Community Earth System Model, with a high top and fine vertical resolution. The model is able to simulate ENSO, the QBO, and the MJO. The ocean-coupled version of the model simulates the QBO, ENSO, and MJO, but does not simulate the observed QBO–MJO connection. When driven with prescribed observed SST anomalies based on composites for QBO east and QBO west (QBOE and QBOW), however, the same atmospheric model produces a modest enhancement of MJO power during QBOE relative to QBOW, as observed. We explore the possibility that the SST anomalies are forced by the QBO itself. Indeed, composite Hovmöller diagrams based on observations show the propagation of QBO zonal wind anomalies all the way from the upper stratosphere to the surface. Also, subsurface ocean temperature composites reveal a similarity between the western Pacific and Indian Ocean subsurface signal between La Niña and QBOE.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Assessing CESM2 Clouds and Their Response to Climate Change Using Cloud Regimes

Abstract The Community Earth System Model, version 2 (CESM2), has a very high climate sensitivity driven by strong positive cloud feedbacks. To evaluate the simulated clouds in the present climate and characterize their response with climate warming, a clustering approach is applied to three independent satellite cloud products and a set of coupled climate simulations. Using k -means clustering with a Wasserstein distance cost function, a set of typical cloud configurations is derived for the satellite cloud products. Using satellite simulator output, the model clouds are classified into the observed cloud regimes in both current and future climates. The model qualitatively reproduces the observed cloud configurations in the historical simulation using the same time period as the satellite observations, but it struggles to capture the observed heterogeneity of clouds which leads to an overestimation of the frequency of a few preferred cloud regimes. This problem is especially apparent for boundary layer clouds. Those low-level cloud regimes also account for much of the climate response in the late twenty-first century in four shared socioeconomic pathway simulations. The model reduces the frequency of occurrence of these low-cloud regimes, especially in tropical regions under large-scale subsidence, in favor of regimes that have weaker cloud radiative effects.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Tropical Interbasin Interaction as Effective Predictors of Late-Spring Precipitation Variability in the Southern Great Plains

Abstract The southern Great Plains experience fluctuating precipitation extremes that significantly impact agriculture and water management. Despite ongoing efforts to enhance forecast accuracy, the underlying causes of these climatic phenomena remain inadequately understood. This study elucidates the relative influence of the tropical Pacific and Atlantic basins on April–May–June precipitation variability in this region. Our partial ocean assimilation experiments using the Community Earth System Model unveil the prominent role of interbasin interaction, with the Pacific and Atlantic contributing approximately 70% and 30%, respectively, to these interbasin contrasts. Our statistical analyses suggest that these tropical interbasin contrasts could serve as a more reliable indicator for late-spring precipitation anomalies than El Niño–Southern Oscillation. The conclusions are reinforced by analyses of seven climate forecasting systems within the North American Multi-Model Ensemble, offering an optimistic outlook for enhancing real-time forecasting of late-spring precipitation in the southern plains. However, the current predictive skills of the interbasin contrasts across the prediction systems are hindered by the lower predictability of the tropical Atlantic Ocean, pointing to the need for future research to refine climate prediction models further. Significance Statement Agriculture and infrastructure in the southern plains face challenges from severe late-spring precipitation extremes. Traditional predictors like El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) lose effectiveness during the critical spring-to-summer transition, creating a forecasting gap. This study introduces the concept of tropical interbasin interactions, known to enhance seasonal predictability for late-spring precipitation in the southern plains. Novel climate model experiments highlight contributions from the tropical Pacific and Atlantic, offering a promising predictability that potentially surpasses the limitations of ENSO-based predictions. These outcomes hold the potential for developing operational forecasts of late-spring precipitation anomalies in the southern plains, enabling proactive risk management.

Chikamoto, Yoshimitsu↗