Articles | Volume 18, issue 8
https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-2349-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-2349-2025
Development and technical paper
 | 
22 Apr 2025
Development and technical paper |  | 22 Apr 2025

The ensemble consistency test: from CESM to MPAS and beyond

Teo Price-Broncucia, Allison Baker, Dorit Hammerling, Michael Duda, and Rebecca Morrison

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Cited articles

Ahn, D. H., Baker, A. H., Bentley, M., Briggs, I., Gopalakrishnan, G., Hammerling, D. M., Laguna, I., Lee, G. L., Milroy, D. J., and Vertenstein, M.: Keeping science on keel when software moves, Commun. ACM, 64, 66–74, https://doi.org/10.1145/3382037, 2021. a, b, c
Baker, A. H., Hammerling, D. M., Levy, M. N., Xu, H., Dennis, J. M., Eaton, B. E., Edwards, J., Hannay, C., Mickelson, S. A., Neale, R. B., Nychka, D., Shollenberger, J., Tribbia, J., Vertenstein, M., and Williamson, D.: A new ensemble-based consistency test for the Community Earth System Model (pyCECT v1.0), Geosci. Model Dev., 8, 2829–2840, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-8-2829-2015, 2015. a, b, c, d, e
Baker, A. H., Hu, Y., Hammerling, D. M., Tseng, Y.-H., Xu, H., Huang, X., Bryan, F. O., and Yang, G.: Evaluating statistical consistency in the ocean model component of the Community Earth System Model (pyCECT v2.0), Geosci. Model Dev., 9, 2391–2406, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-2391-2016, 2016. a
Baker, A., Price-Broncucia, T., Xu, H., Milroy, D., and Johnson, B.: pyCECT: Tools to support and run the CESM Ensemble Consistency Test, Zenodo [code and data set] https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11662747, 2024. 
Charney, J. G., Fjörtoft, R., and Von Neumann, J.: Numerical Integration of the Barotropic Vorticity Equation, Tellus, 2, 237–254, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2153-3490.1950.tb00336.x, 1950. a
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Short summary
The ensemble consistency test (ECT) and its ultrafast variant (UF-ECT) have become powerful tools in the development community for the identification of unwanted changes in the Community Earth System Model (CESM). We develop a generalized setup framework to enable easy adoption of the ECT approach for other model developers and communities. This framework specifies test parameters to accurately characterize model variability and balance test sensitivity and computational cost.
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