EMC/HPC/MPC/NCO/CPC synergy meeting highlights 07/30/01



This meeting was led by Peter Manousos and followed a generic agenda denoted by the subtitles below. Attendees included Wayman Baker, Brett McDonald, Pete Kaplan, Bill Bua, Jim Hoke, Hua-Lu Pan, Ed Danaher, Dave Reynolds, and Keith Brill.



1. IBM SP

Wayman reported that IBM SP has been running with no problems and that 2 additional frames will be added to the IBM SP (1 Frame includes 16 nodes in which there are 4 processors per node) by the middle of August. These hardware additions will be used to run the operational climate model, which is intended to be implemented in September. Work continues on how to optimize the IBM SP for running the 20km RUC in light of the 12km Eta implementation proposed for November.



2. Notes from EMC

a. Global Modeling Group: Hua-Lu Pan reported that the minor fixes to the spring upgrade package have been tested and accepted with scheduled implementation by the end of August. T254 resolution tests are scheduled to begin mid to late August.



b. Mesoscale Modeling Group: Most of the group was at the AMS meeting in Ft. Lauderdale FL. However, Geoff DiMego still sent a status via email stating "Our focus is getting 12 km version of the Meso Eta going into parallel and getting a final version of the new grid-scale precip/microphysics ready for testing. This new schme does not product eh bulls-eyes of precip we fist saw in the nested threats runs and which have occurred recently in the later ranges of the 22km runs. It does now produce worse scores for RH (wetter bias seems to be the cause) but better in everything else."



c. Short range ensembles (SREF): Brett McDonald reported that Phase II of the SREF implementation has been completed. This implies that all the products available on the SREF web page are now provided in grib format from the SP and that this process is supported by NCO.



d. Global ensembles : Nothing reported.



3. Input to EMC from Operational Centers

Dave Reynolds asked for the record if the off time Eta run output could be extended at least to 54 hours and even to 60 and 84 hours. Dave also commented on the tendency of convective feedback-ish like bulls-eyes in QPF occurring with some regularity in the 22km Eta over the past 2-3 weeks in the upper mid west. Also noted were the inordinately high but small scale PW values associated with these bulls-eyes. These occur in both the post and pre spring/summer bundle Eta implementation. The AVN was also noted to have inordinately high small scale PW values not directly associated with bulls eyes in the upper mid west.



Finally Hua-Lu was asked on the status of the memo describing the AVN/MRF going to a single 15-day global model forecast run 4x/day. The contents of this memo have been agreed upon unanimously by the NCEP centers and will be forwarded to the NCEP director. This memo needs to be sent to the NWS corporate board for review and discussion on how to expedite followed.



4. Next Meeting Proposed Monday August 27, at noon in room 209.