Earth System Model Evaluation Tool (ESMValTool) v2.0 – diagnostics for extreme events, regional and impact evaluation, and analysis of Earth system models in CMIP

Abstract

Abstract. This paper complements a series of now four publications that\ndocument the release of the Earth System Model Evaluation Tool (ESMValTool)\nv2.0. It describes new diagnostics on the hydrological cycle, extreme\nevents, impact assessment, regional evaluations, and ensemble member\nselection. The diagnostics are developed by a large community of scientists\naiming to facilitate the evaluation and comparison of Earth system models\n(ESMs) which are participating in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project\n(CMIP). The second release of this tool aims to support the evaluation of\nESMs participating in CMIP Phase 6 (CMIP6). Furthermore, datasets from\nother models and observations can be analysed. The diagnostics for the\nhydrological cycle include several precipitation and drought indices, as\nwell as hydroclimatic intensity and indices from the Expert Team on Climate\nChange Detection and Indices (ETCCDI). The latter are also used for\nidentification of extreme events, for impact assessment, and to project\nand characterize the risks and impacts of climate change for natural and\nsocio-economic systems. Further impact assessment diagnostics are included\nto compute daily temperature ranges and capacity factors for wind and solar\nenergy generation. Regional scales can be analysed with new diagnostics\nimplemented for selected regions and stochastic downscaling. ESMValTool v2.0\nalso includes diagnostics to analyse large multi-model ensembles including\ngrouping and selecting ensemble members by user-specified criteria. Here, we\npresent examples for their capabilities based on the well-established CMIP\nPhase\xa05 (CMIP5) dataset.