Storm Warning: America's Earth Science · Episode 9 of 12 · 39 min
Simulating the Earth: The Open Model
A Boulder laboratory built a model of the whole Earth system, atmosphere, ocean, land and ice, and gave it away. NCAR's 1983 Community Climate Model was released free to researchers and grew into the Community Earth System Model, public infrastructure used for global climate projections. The episode argues it is worth protecting as the 2025-26 threat to NCAR grew.
Who's who
- Warren WashingtonNCAR computational scientist who helped build early atmosphere models
- Akira KasaharaMeteorologist who co-led NCAR's early atmosphere model
Where it happens
- Boulder, Colorado+3 more episodesHome of NCAR, where the community models were built
- Cheyenne, Wyoming+2 more episodesSite of the NSF NCAR-Wyoming Supercomputing Center
Timeline
- 1967Washington and Kasahara publish NCAR's global atmospheric circulation model
- 1983NCAR releases the freely available Community Climate Model
- 1996First coupled Climate System Model released
- June 25, 2010Community Earth System Model 1.0 released
- July 7, 2023Derecho supercomputer launches
- March 2026UCAR sues NSF to block funding cuts; judge issues temporary block
Still debated
CESM2 runs warmer than many other models, projected hurricane frequency signals depend on method, and its ice-sheet simulations may understate the pace of Antarctic change. Whether a private operator could steward a community model as well as a public institution is also disputed.