Project Details
Increasing our confidence in the predictive capabilities of Earth system models for high-latitude regions of the world requires a coordinated set of investigations that target improved process understanding and model representation of complex land surface and subsurface interactions. Better representing these key interactions is especially important for Arctic ecosystems where ice-rich landscapes mean that topography, hydrology, vegetation, and biogeochemistry are inextricably linked. The Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments in the Arctic project, or NGEE Arctic, seeks to address this challenge by quantifying the physical, chemical, and biological behavior of terrestrial ecosystems in Alaska.
NGEE Arctic Phase 4 is leveraging computational, diagnostic, remote sensing, and data synthesis tools to quantify improvements in prediction of ecosystem-environment feedbacks at the global scale in an Arctic-informed version of the land surface component of the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM). NGEE Arctic Phase 4 will deliver an unprecedented ability to predict the consequences of interacting Arctic processes for the region and the world.
Building on the success of Phases 1–3, NGEE Arctic researchers will test the team's newly-developed predictive understanding under novel conditions across the Arctic domain. Phase 4 will be guided by the following overarching science question: How do vegetation change and permafrost thaw interact to affect ecosystem feedbacks across the pan-Arctic? To answer this question, the team will evaluate an Arctic-informed version of the E3SM land model (ELM) against pan-Arctic benchmark data sets and against site-specific to regional-scale observations derived from a range of model evaluation sites that span the pan-Arctic. Crosscuts that encompass the themes of dynamics and disturbance, scaling, and data synthesis and evaluation will allow inference gained from model evaluation at the site level to be extended to regional and pan-Arctic scales. In turn, hypothesis-driven model–experiment (Mod-Ex) subquestions will provide additional insights into model process representation at model evaluation sites and provide avenues for needed model improvements.
NGEE Arctic science in Phase 4 will be underlaid by a culture of safety and openly shared data, as well as collaboration with international scientists, other DOE-funded Arctic projects, and sister project NASA ABoVE. By the end of Phase 4, NGEE Arctic will have quantified improvements in prediction of ecosystem-environment feedbacks at the global scale in an Arctic-informed version of ELM (ELM-Arctic), delivering an unprecedented ability to predict the consequences of interacting Arctic processes for the globe.
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