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4.2 How does a climate model work?

Climate models simulate the different components of the climate system: the atmosphere, the ocean, continental surfaces, ice sheets (Figure 15, red frame). The atmospheric component of climate models numerically solves the fluid mechanics equations on a 3D grid of the Earth's atmosphere (green frame). The size of grid boxes is about 100 km. Processes smaller than grid boxes, such as clouds, rain or radiation, are represented by so-called physical parameterizations. For example, physical parameterizations calculate how much water vapor is condensed from the water vapor in each grid box, what proportion of this condensed water precipitates to form rain, what proportion of this rain evaporates when falling, in average in each grid box.

Figure 15: Schematic illustrating the different components of a climate model.
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Camille RISI 2023-07-24