Use of circulation types classifications to evaluate AR4 climate models over the Euro-Atlantic region

摘要: This paper presents an evaluation of the multi-model simulations for 4th Assessment Report Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in terms their ability to simulate ERA40 circulation types over Euro-Atlantic region winter season. Two classification schemes, k-means and SANDRA, have been considered test sensitivity results procedure. The assessment allows establishing different rankings attending spatial temporal features types. Regarding characteristics, general, all AR4 models tend underestimate frequency occurrence. best model simulating characteristics is UKMO-HadGEM1 whereas CCSM3, CGCM3.1(T63) are features, both schemes. result agrees with ranking obtained when having analysed same variability modes. study has proved utility applying such a synoptic climatology approach as diagnostic tool models’ assessment. properly reproduce position ridges troughs patterns, will therefore improve our confidence response future climate changes.