The history of numerical weather prediction considers how current weather conditions as input into mathematical models of the atmosphere and oceans to predict the weather and future sea state (the process of numerical weather prediction) has changed over the years. Though first attempted manually in the 1920s, it was not until the advent of the computer and computer simulation that computation time was reduced to less than the forecast period itself. ENIAC was used to create the first forecasts via computer in 1950, and over the years more powerful computers have been used to increase the size of initial datasets and use more complicated versions of the equations of motion. The development of global forecasting models led to the first climate models. The development of limited area (regional) models facilitated advances in forecasting the tracks of tropical cyclone as well as air quality in the 1970s and 1980s.
Because the output of forecast models based on atmospheric dynamics requires corrections near ground level, model output statistics (MOS) were developed in the 1970s and 1980s for individual forecast points (locations). The MOS apply statistical techniques to post-process the output of dynamical models with the most recent surface observations and the forecast point's climatology. This technique can correct for model resolution as well as model biases. Even with the increasing power of supercomputers, the forecast skill of numerical weather models only extends to about two weeks into the future, since the density and quality of observations—together with the chaotic nature of the partial differential equations used to calculate the forecast—introduce errors which double every five days. The use of model ensemble forecasts since the 1990s helps to define the forecast uncertainty and extend weather forecasting farther into the future than otherwise possible.
Background Until the end of the 19th century, weather prediction was entirely subjective and based on empirical rules, with only limited understanding of the physical mechanisms behind weather processes. In 1901 Cleveland Abbe, founder of the United States Weather Bureau, proposed that the atmosphere is governed by the same principles of thermodynamics and hydrodynamics that were studied in the previous century. In 1904, Vilhelm Bjerknes derived a two-step procedure for model-based weather forecasting. First, a diagnostic step is used to process data to generate initial conditions, which are then advanced in time by a prognostic step that solves the initial value problem. He also identified seven variables that defined the state of the atmosphere at a given point: pressure, temperature, density, humidity, and the three components of the flow velocity vector. Bjerknes pointed out that equations based on mass continuity, conservation of momentum, the first and second laws of thermodynamics, and the ideal gas law could be used to estimate the state of the atmosphere in the future through numerical methods. With the exception of the second law of thermodynamics, these equations form the basis of the primitive equations used in present-day weather models.
In 1922, Lewis Fry Richardson published the first attempt at forecasting the weather numerically. Using a hydrostatic variation of Bjerknes's primitive equations, Richardson produced by hand a 6-hour forecast for the state of the atmosphere over two points in central Europe, taking at least six weeks to do so. His forecast calculated that the change in surface pressure would be , an unrealistic value incorrect by two orders of magnitude. The large error was caused by an imbalance in the pressure and wind velocity fields used as the initial conditions in his analysis.
The first successful numerical prediction was performed using the ENIAC digital computer in 1950 by a team led by American meteorologist Jule Charney. The team include Philip Thompson, Larry Gates, and Norwegian meteorologist Ragnar Fjørtoft, applied mathematician John von Neumann, and computer programmer Klara Dan von Neumann, M. H. Frankel, Jerome Namias, John C. Freeman Jr., Francis Reichelderfer, George Platzman, and Joseph Smagorinsky. They used a simplified form of atmospheric dynamics based on solving the barotropic vorticity equation over a single layer of the atmosphere, by computing the geopotential height of the atmosphere's pressure surface. This simplification greatly reduced demands on computer time and memory, so the computations could be performed on the relatively primitive computers of the day. When news of the first weather forecast by ENIAC was received by Richardson in 1950, he remarked that the results were an "enormous scientific advance." The first calculations for a 24‑hour forecast took ENIAC nearly 24 hours to produce, but Charney's group noted that most of that time was spent in "manual operations", and expressed hope that forecasts of the weather before it occurs would soon be realized.
In the United Kingdom the Meteorological Office first numerical weather prediction was completed by F. H. Bushby and Mavis Hinds in 1952 under the guidance of John Sawyer. These experimental forecasts were generated using a 12 × 8 grid with a grid spacing of 260 km, a one-hour time-step, and required four hours of computing time for a 24-hour forecast on the EDSAC computer at the University of Cambridge and the LEO computer developed by J. Lyons and Co. Following these initial experiments, work moved to the Ferranti Mark 1 computer at the Manchester University Department of Electrical Engineering and in 1959 a Ferranti Mercury computer, known as 'Meteor', was installed at the Met Office. This article contains quotations from this source, which is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0. © Crown copyright.
Early years In September 1954, Carl-Gustav Rossby assembled an international group of meteorologists in Stockholm and produced the first operational forecast (i.e. routine predictions for practical use) based on the barotropic equation. Operational numerical weather prediction in the United States began in 1955 under the Joint Numerical Weather Prediction Unit (JNWPU), a joint project by the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Weather Bureau. The JNWPU model was originally a three-layer barotropic model, also developed by Charney. It only modeled the atmosphere in the Northern Hemisphere. In 1956, the JNWPU switched to a two-layer thermotropic model developed by Thompson and Gates. The main assumption made by the thermotropic model is that while the magnitude of the thermal wind may change, its direction does not change with respect to height, and thus the baroclinicity in the atmosphere can be simulated using the geopotential height surfaces and the average thermal wind between them. However, due to the low skill showed by the thermotropic model, the JNWPU reverted to the single-layer barotropic model in 1958. The Japanese Meteorological Agency became the third organization to initiate operational numerical weather prediction in 1959. The first real-time forecasts made by Australia's Bureau of Meteorology in 1969 for portions of the Southern Hemisphere were also based on the single-layer barotropic model.
Later models used more complete equations for atmospheric dynamics and thermodynamics. In 1959, Karl-Heinz Hinkelmann produced the first reasonable primitive equation forecast, 37 years after Richardson's failed attempt. Hinkelmann did so by removing small oscillations from the numerical model during initialization. In 1966, West Germany and the United States began producing operational forecasts based on primitive-equation models, followed by the United Kingdom in 1972 and Australia in 1977. Later additions to primitive equation models allowed additional insight into different weather phenomena. In the United States, solar radiation effects were added to the primitive equation model in 1967; moisture effects and latent heat were added in 1968; and feedback effects from rain on convection were incorporated in 1971. Three years later, the first global forecast model was introduced. Sea ice began to be initialized in forecast models in 1971. Efforts to involve sea surface temperature in model initialization began in 1972 due to its role in modulating weather in higher latitudes of the Pacific.
Global forecast models
A global forecast model is a weather forecasting model which initializes and forecasts the weather throughout the Earth's troposphere. It is a computer program that produces meteorological information for future times at given locations and altitudes. Within any modern model is a set of equations, known as the primitive equations, used to predict the future state of the atmosphere. These equations—along with the ideal gas law—are used to evolve the density, pressure, and potential temperature scalar fields and the flow velocity vector field of the atmosphere through time. Additional transport equations for pollutants and other aerosols are included in some primitive-equation high-resolution models as well. The equations used are nonlinear partial differential equations which are impossible to solve exactly through analytical methods, with the exception of a few idealized cases. Therefore, numerical methods obtain approximate solutions. Different models use different solution methods: some global models and almost all regional models use finite difference methods for all three spatial dimensions, while other global models and a few regional models use spectral methods for the horizontal dimensions and finite-difference methods in the vertical.
The National Meteorological Center's Global Spectral Model was introduced during August 1980. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts model debuted on May 1, 1985. The United Kingdom Met Office has been running their global model since the late 1980s, adding a 3D-Var data assimilation scheme in mid-1999. The Canadian Meteorological Centre has been running a global model since 1991. The United States ran the Nested Grid Model (NGM) from 1987 to 2000, with some features lasting as late as 2009. Between 2000 and 2002, the Environmental Modeling Center ran the Aviation (AVN) model for shorter range forecasts and the Medium Range Forecast (MRF) model at longer time ranges. During this time, the AVN model was extended to the end of the forecast period, eliminating the need of the MRF and thereby replacing it. In late 2002, the AVN model was renamed the Global Forecast System (GFS). The German Weather Service has been running their global hydrostatic model, the GME, using a hexagonal icosahedral grid since 2002. The GFS is slated to eventually be supplanted by the Flow-following, finite-volume Icosahedral Model (FIM), which like the GME is gridded on a truncated icosahedron, in the mid-2010s.
Global climate models