Towards assessing NARCCAP regional climate model credibility for the North American monsoon: Current climate simulations

When forced with different atmosphere–ocean coupled global climate models (AOGCMs) for the current period, the skill of the RCMs subdivides largely by the skill of the forcing or "parent" AOGCM. How the inherited biases affect the RCM simulations is investigated. While it is clear that the AOGCMs have a large influence on the RCMs, the authors also demonstrate where the regional models add value to the simulations and discuss the differential credibility of the six RCMs (17 total simulations), two AGCM time slices, and four AOGCMs examined herein.

It is found that in-depth analysis of parent GCM and RCM scenarios can identify a meaningful subset of models that can produce credible simulations of the North American monsoon precipitation.