This is a proof of concept and review paper of spatial agents, with initial research focusing on geomodelling. The results may be of interest to others working on complex regional geological modelling with sparse data. Structural agent-based swarming behaviour is key to advancing this field. The study provides groundwork for research in structural geology 3D modelling with spatial agents. This work was done with NetLogo, a free agent modelling platform used mostly for teaching complex systems.

We review different techniques to model the Earth's subsurface from geophysical data (gravity field anomaly, magnetic field anomaly) using geological models and measurements of the rocks' properties. We show examples of application using idealised examples reproducing realistic features and provide theoretical details of the open-source algorithm we use.

We have developed a software that allows the user to extract and standardize drill hole information from legacy datasets and/or different drilling campaigns. It also provides functionality to upscale the lithological information. These functionalities were possible by developing thesauri to identify and group geological terminologies together.

We present the first step in testing a new land model as part of a new Earth system model. Our model links plant hydraulics, stomatal optimization theory, and a comprehensive canopy radiation scheme. We compared model-predicted carbon and water fluxes to flux tower observations and model-predicted sun-induced chlorophyll fluorescence to satellite retrievals. Our model quantitatively predicted the carbon and water fluxes as well as the canopy fluorescence yield.

When insects fill the lower kilometers of the atmosphere, they get caught in the convergent parts of the wind field. Their concentration visualizes the otherwise invisible circulation on radar images. This study shows how clear-air radar data can be compared to simulated wind fields in terms of scale, anisotropy, and direction. Despite known difficulties with simulating these near-surface wind systems, we find decent agreement between a long-term simulation and the German radar mosaic.

The CHIMERE chemistry-transport model is presented in its new version, V2020r1. Many changes are proposed compared to the previous version. These include online modeling, new parameterizations for aerosols, new emissions schemes, a new parameter file format, the subgrid-scale variability of urban concentrations and new transport schemes.

Although there have been significant advances in river routing and sub-grid heterogeneity (i.e., tiling) schemes in Earth system models over the past decades, there has yet to be a concerted effort to couple these two concepts. This paper aims to bridge this gap through the development of a two-way coupling between tiling schemes and river networks in the HydroBlocks land surface model. The scheme is implemented and tested over a 1 arc degree domain in Oklahoma, United States.

The turbidity maximum zone (TMZ) is a special phenomenon in estuaries worldwide. However, the extraction methods and criteria used to describe the TMZ vary significantly both spatially and temporally. This study proposes an new index, the turbidity maximum zone index, based on the corresponding relationship of total suspended solid concentration and Chl a concentration, which could better extract TMZs in different estuaries and on different dates.

Ice algae are tiny plants like phytoplankton but they grow within sea ice. In polar regions, both phytoplankton and ice algae are the foundation of marine ecosystems and play an important role in taking up carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. However, state-of-the-art climate models typically do not include ice algae, and therefore their role in the climate system remains unclear. This project aims to address this knowledge gap by coordinating a set of experiments using sea-ice–ocean models.

CanESM5 decadal predictions that started from observed climate states represent the observed evolution of upper-ocean temperatures, surface climate, and the carbon cycle better than ones not started from observed climate states for several years into the forecast. This is due both to better representations of climate internal variability and to corrections of the model response to external forcing including changes in GHG emissions and aerosols.

Understanding and quantifying water partitioning in dryland regions are of key importance to anticipate the future impacts of climate change in water resources and dryland ecosystems. Here, we have developed a simple hydrological model (DRYP) that incorporates the key processes of water partitioning in drylands. DRYP is a modular, versatile, and parsimonious model that can be used to anticipate and plan for climatic and anthropogenic changes to water fluxes and storage in dryland regions.

The Andes act as a wall in atmospheric flows and play an important role in the weather of South America but are currently underrepresented in weather and climate models. In this work, we propose grids that better capture the mountains and, using idealized dynamical models, study the effects caused by the use of such grids. While possibly improving forecasts for short periods, the grids introduce spurious numerical (nonphysical) effects, which can demand added caution from model developers.

We present a test case of river plume spreading to evaluate coastal ocean models. Our test case reveals the level of numerical mixing (due to parameterizations used and numerical treatment of processes in the model) and the ability of models to reproduce complex dynamics. The major result of our comparative study is that accuracy in reproducing the analytical solution depends less on the type of applied model architecture or numerical grid than it does on the type of advection scheme.

Considering the sophisticated energy exchanges and multivariate coupling in ENSO, we subjectively incorporate the prior physical knowledge into the modeling process and build up an ENSO deep learning forecast model with a multivariate air–sea coupler, named ENSO-ASC, the performance of which outperforms the other state-of-the-art models. The extensive experiments indicate that ENSO-ASC is a powerful tool for both the ENSO prediction and for the analysis of the underlying complex mechanisms.

The multiscale Street-in-Grid model is used to simulate black carbon (BC) concentrations in streets. To respect street-surface mass balance, particle resuspension is estimated with a new approach based on deposited mass. The contribution of resuspension is low, but non-exhaust emissions from tyre wear may largely contribute to BC concentrations. The impact of the two-way dynamic coupling between scales on BC concentrations varies depending on the street geometry and traffic emission intensity.

This study reports the first evaluation of the global EMEP MSC-W ACTM driven by WRF meteorology, with a focus on surface concentrations and wet deposition of reactive N and S species. The model–measurement comparison is conducted both spatially and temporally, covering 10 monitoring networks worldwide. The statistics from the comprehensive evaluations presented in this study support the application of this model framework for global analysis of the budgets and fluxes of reactive N and SIA.

This paper introduces SuperflexPy, an open-source Python framework for building flexible conceptual hydrological models. SuperflexPy is available as open-source code and can be used by the hydrological community to investigate improved process representations, for model comparison, and for operational work.

The Norwegian Climate Prediction Model version 1 (NorCPM1) is a new research tool for performing climate reanalyses and seasonal-to-decadal climate predictions. It adds data assimilation capability to the Norwegian Earth System Model version 1 (NorESM1) and has contributed output to the Decadal Climate Prediction Project (DCPP) as part of the sixth Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6). We describe the system and evaluate its baseline, reanalysis and prediction performance.

The development of forecasting tools may help to limit the impacts of flash floods. Our purpose here is to demonstrate the possibility of using b-flood, which is a 2D tool based on shallow-water equations and adaptive mesh refinement.

In times of worldwide energy transitions, an understanding of the subsurface is increasingly important to provide renewable energy sources such as geothermal energy. To validate our understanding of the subsurface we require data. However, the data are usually not distributed equally and introduce a potential misinterpretation of the subsurface. Therefore, in this study we investigate the influence of measurements on temperature distribution in the European Alps.

OMEN-SED is a model for early diagenesis in marine sediments simulating organic matter (OM) degradation and nutrient dynamics. We replaced the original description with a more realistic one accounting for the widely observed decrease in OM reactivity. The new model reproduces pore water profiles and sediment–water interface fluxes across different environments. This functionality extends the model’s applicability to a broad range of environments and timescales while requiring fewer parameters.

In light of the dramatic increase in economic impacts due to wildfires, the need for modelling impacts of wildfire damage is ever increasing. Insurance companies, households, humanitarian organisations and governmental authorities are worried by climate risks. In this study we present an approach to modelling wildfire impacts using the open-source modelling platform CLIMADA. All input data are free, public and globally available, ensuring applicability in data-scarce regions of the Global South.

The two-way coupled WRF-CMAQ model accounting for complex chemistry–meteorology feedbacks has been applied to the long-term predictions of regional meteorology and air quality over the US. The model results show superior performance and importance of chemistry–meteorology feedbacks when compared to the offline coupled WRF and CMAQ simulations, which suggests that feedbacks should be considered along with other factors in developing future model applications to inform policy making.