WACCM-X simulation of the "April Fools" geomagnetic storm in 2001, showing the global electron column density in units of 10^12 cm^-2. Note the "tongue of ionization" extending out of both the north and south auroral regions into the dayside low-latitudes, and the highly distorted equatorial ionosphere.

The Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model with thermosphere and ionosphere extension (WACCM-X) is a comprehensive numerical model, spanning the range of altitude from the Earth’s surface to the upper thermosphere.

The scientific goals of the model include studying solar impacts on the Earth atmosphere, couplings between atmosphere layers through chemical, physical and dynamical processes, and the implications of the coupling for the climate and for the near space environment. The development of the model is inter-divisional collaboration that unifies certain aspects of the upper atmospheric modeling of HAO, the middle atmosphere modeling of ACOM, and the tropospheric modeling of CGD, using the NCAR Community Earth System Model (CESM) as a common numerical framework.

Overview:

• WACCM-X overview

• WACCM-X Tutorial

• WACCM-X v. 2.0 Science Guide (preliminary draft)

• WACCM-X v. 2.0 Model Description Paper

More Information:

• WACCM-X information and tutorials at CESM:

-CESM main page
-CESM quick start guide
-WACCM-X Compsets
-CESM/WACCM-X description

• Whole Atmosphere Working Group:

-http://www.cesm.ucar.edu/working_groups/Whole-Atmosphere/

• WACCM at ACOM:

-https://www2.acom.ucar.edu/gcm/waccm

• Sign up for WACCM-X Mailing list

-https://www2.hao.ucar.edu/modeling/waccm-x/mailing-list

News and Updates:

• Extended runs of WACCM-X v. 2.1 with specified dynamics forcing available for analysis

-https://www2.hao.ucar.edu/modeling/sd/waccm-x/ExtendedRuns

• Climate change model output archived (Solomon et al., 2018; 2019)

-https://doi.org/10.26024/ypnz-d857

• WACCM-X v. 2.1, is released as part of the Community Earth System Model, v. 2.1, January 2019.

-Release Notes for WACCM-X v.2.1

• WACCM-X v. 2.0, with fully-interactive ionosphere, is released as part of the Community Earth System Model, v. 2.0, June 2018.

-Release Notes for WACCM-X v.2.0
-http://www.cesm.ucar.edu/models/cesm2
-http://www.cesm.ucar.edu/models/cesm2/whatsnew.html

Recent Workshops and Symposia:

• System Science Workshop 2018

• CEDAR Workshop 2018

• Whole Atmosphere Modeling Workshop, June 13-15, 2018

• Whole Atmosphere Working Group Meeting, Feb. 12–14, 2018

• WACCM-X Users Group tutorial session at the CEDAR Workshop, June 22, 2017

• Whole Atmosphere Variability session at the CEDAR Workshop, June 22, 2017

• Whole Atmosphere Working Group meeting at the CESM Workshop, June 20, 2017