Propagation of biases in climate models from the synoptic to the regional scale: Implications for bias adjustment

Biases in the synoptic circulation are for instance often overlooked when postprocessing regional climate model (RCM) simulations driven by general circulation models (GCMs). Yet considering atmospheric circulation helps to establish links between the synoptic and the regional scale, and thereby provides insights into the physical processes leading to RCM biases.

Here we investigate how synoptic circulation biases impact regional climate simulations and influence our ability to mitigate biases in precipitation and temperature using quantile mapping. We considered 20 GCM-RCM combinations from the ENSEMBLES project and characterized the dominant atmospheric flow over the Alpine domain using circulation types. We report in particular a systematic overestimation of the frequency of westerly flow in winter.