Articles | Volume 18, issue 20
https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-7735-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-7735-2025
Development and technical paper
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23 Oct 2025
Development and technical paper | Highlight paper |  | 23 Oct 2025

nextGEMS: entering the era of kilometer-scale Earth system modeling

Hans Segura, Xabier Pedruzo-Bagazgoitia, Philipp Weiss, Sebastian K. Müller, Thomas Rackow, Junhong Lee, Edgar Dolores-Tesillos, Imme Benedict, Matthias Aengenheyster, Razvan Aguridan, Gabriele Arduini, Alexander J. Baker, Jiawei Bao, Swantje Bastin, Eulàlia Baulenas, Tobias Becker, Sebastian Beyer, Hendryk Bockelmann, Nils Brüggemann, Lukas Brunner, Suvarchal K. Cheedela, Sushant Das, Jasper Denissen, Ian Dragaud, Piotr Dziekan, Madeleine Ekblom, Jan Frederik Engels, Monika Esch, Richard Forbes, Claudia Frauen, Lilli Freischem, Diego García-Maroto, Philipp Geier, Paul Gierz, Álvaro González-Cervera, Katherine Grayson, Matthew Griffith, Oliver Gutjahr, Helmuth Haak, Ioan Hadade, Kerstin Haslehner, Shabeh ul Hasson, Jan Hegewald, Lukas Kluft, Aleksei Koldunov, Nikolay Koldunov, Tobias Kölling, Shunya Koseki, Sergey Kosukhin, Josh Kousal, Peter Kuma, Arjun U. Kumar, Rumeng Li, Nicolas Maury, Maximilian Meindl, Sebastian Milinski, Kristian Mogensen, Bimochan Niraula, Jakub Nowak, Divya Sri Praturi, Ulrike Proske, Dian Putrasahan, René Redler, David Santuy, Domokos Sármány, Reiner Schnur, Patrick Scholz, Dmitry Sidorenko, Dorian Spät, Birgit Sützl, Daisuke Takasuka, Adrian Tompkins, Alejandro Uribe, Mirco Valentini, Menno Veerman, Aiko Voigt, Sarah Warnau, Fabian Wachsmann, Marta Wacławczyk, Nils Wedi, Karl-Hermann Wieners, Jonathan Wille, Marius Winkler, Yuting Wu, Florian Ziemen, Janos Zimmermann, Frida A.-M. Bender, Dragana Bojovic, Sandrine Bony, Simona Bordoni, Patrice Brehmer, Marcus Dengler, Emanuel Dutra, Saliou Faye, Erich Fischer, Chiel van Heerwaarden, Cathy Hohenegger, Heikki Järvinen, Markus Jochum, Thomas Jung, Johann H. Jungclaus, Noel S. Keenlyside, Daniel Klocke, Heike Konow, Martina Klose, Szymon Malinowski, Olivia Martius, Thorsten Mauritsen, Juan Pedro Mellado, Theresa Mieslinger, Elsa Mohino, Hanna Pawłowska, Karsten Peters-von Gehlen, Abdoulaye Sarré, Pajam Sobhani, Philip Stier, Lauri Tuppi, Pier Luigi Vidale, Irina Sandu, and Bjorn Stevens

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Geosci. Model Dev., 16, 779–811, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-779-2023,https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-779-2023, 2023
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Cited articles

Adamidis, P., Pfister, E., Bockelmann, H., Zobel, D., Beismann, J.-O., and Jacob, M.: The real challenges for climate and weather modelling on its way to sustained exascale performance: a case study using ICON (v2.6.6), Geosci. Model Dev., 18, 905–919, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-905-2025, 2025. a
Baker, A. J., Vannière, B., and Vidale, P. L.: On the Realism of Tropical Cyclone Intensification in Global Storm-Resolving Climate Models, Geophysical Research Letters, 51, e2024GL109841, https://doi.org/10.1029/2024GL109841, 2024. a
Baldauf, M., Seifert, A., Förstner, J., Majewski, D., Raschendorfer, M., and Reinhardt, T.: Operational Convective-Scale Numerical Weather Prediction with the COSMO Model: Description and Sensitivities, Monthly Weather Review, 139, 3887–3905, https://doi.org/10.1175/MWR-D-10-05013.1, 2011. a
Bao, J., Stevens, B., Kluft, L., and Muller, C.: Intensification of daily tropical precipitation extremes from more organized convection, Science Advances, 10, eadj6801, https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adj6801, 2024. a
Becker, T., Bechtold, P., and Sandu, I.: Characteristics of convective precipitation over tropical Africa in storm-resolving global simulations, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, 147, 4388–4407, https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.4185, 2021. a
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Executive editor
Kilometre-scale global climate models are pivotal for delivering nuanced regional climate insights and informing climate action, though they face the formidable challenge of balancing computational demands with the precision required to simulate complex subgrid processes. This paper is one of the landmarks in climate modelling, demonstrating the potential of kilometre-scale models to enhance regional climate understanding. It overcomes computational hurdles to achieve high-resolution simulations, crucial for capturing mesoscale phenomena. The authors' transparent exploration of challenges and successes makes this a vital read for climate scientists, offering insights into the future of climate modelling and its applications in climate action.
Short summary
The Next Generation of Earth Modeling Systems project (nextGEMS) developed two Earth system models that use horizontal grid spacing of 10 km and finer, giving more fidelity to the representation of local phenomena, globally. In its fourth cycle, nextGEMS simulated the Earth System climate over the 2020–2049 period under the SSP3-7.0 scenario. Here, we provide an overview of nextGEMS, insights into the model development, and the realism of multi-decadal, kilometer-scale simulations.
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