June 2008

FINAL REPORT
FDEP No. RM078 (USF No. 47 10 1074 00)

Containing

“The Final Report for Project 5: Development of a Real-Time High-Resolution

Ocean and Atmospheric Modeling System for the Florida Region”

PI: Prof. Eric P. Chassignet (FSU)

Co-PIs: Dmitry S. Dukhovskoy (FSU) and Steven L. Morey (FSU)

June 2008

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Summary
The purpose of this project is to develop a high-resolution ocean and atmospheric
modeling system for the western Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico focusing on the
southeastern United States coastal region, to encompass the relevant ocean and
atmospheric processes that directly affect Florida’s coastal waters. The modeling system,
developed using the HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM) and a variant of the
Research and Forecasting (WRF) model, is run in near real-time, and output is delivered
on a publicly accessible data server so that the model fields can be used as forcing, initial
conditions and boundary conditions for ultra-high-resolution nested coastal and estuarine
models along the Florida coast.

Background
An Integrated Coastal Ocean Observing System (COOS) requires the integration of
observations, data management and models for monitoring and forecasting. Accurate
very high-resolution coastal ocean and atmospheric models need to be nested within
larger scale data assimilative modeling systems so that the influence of important non-
local effects can be properly simulated. Thus, the regional modeling system developed
by this project is intended to be used not only for forecasting and studies of the regional
ocean and atmosphere, but also as a critical component to the design and establishment of
a real-time interdisciplinary observing system for Florida’s coastal regions and
contiguous waters important to and affecting Florida’s coasts.

Florida’s coastal waters are dynamically linked with distant parts of the Atlantic Ocean,
Caribbean Sea, and Gulf of Mexico through the North Atlantic’s western boundary
current system, which includes the Yucatan Current, Loop Current, Florida Current and
Gulf Stream. This intense ocean current system transports water and biological material
originating in coastal margins and reefs of the Caribbean. The current system can serve
as a transport conduit for larvae and other organisms important to Florida’s marine
ecosystems. Additionally, the current system impinges very close to Florida’s
continental shelves and is an important forcing mechanism for the shelf and coastal
circulation. Therefore, understanding and modeling the regional circulation of the
western Atlantic, Caribbean Sea, and Gulf of Mexico is critical to studies, models, and
forecasts for Florida’s waters.

Similar to the dependence of Florida’s marine environment to non-local circulation, the

atmosphere driving the coastal waters depends on the larger scale atmospheric
circulation. In particular, there can be great variability in atmospheric conditions over
short spatial scales near the coast that are critical to the coastal ocean circulation, but not
well resolved by available atmospheric models. Therefore, very high-resolution
atmospheric models are a necessary tool for modeling and predicting coastal circulation
processes and are part of an integrated COOS. These atmospheric models are highly
dependent on larger scale models due to the relatively fast movement of weather patterns
across the ocean and land.

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Accomplishments
This project has resulted in the development of a high-resolution ocean and atmospheric
modeling system for the western Atlantic, southeastern United States and Gulf of Mexico
region that impacts Florida’s coastal waters and overlying atmosphere. The ocean model
has been developed using the HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM) and the
Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model implemented as the Advanced Research
WRF (WRF-ARW). The models run in near real-time with output delivered over a
public data server.

The HYCOM features a hybrid vertical coordinate system that combines three different
methods of vertical discretization: isopycnal coordinates, pressure coordinates, and sigma
coordinates, optimally distributed at each time step [Bleck 2002; Chassignet et al., 2003;
Halliwell, 2004; Chassignet et al., 2005; Chassignet et al., 2006a,b]. The isopycnal
coordinates are used in the open stratified ocean. These coordinate surfaces are smoothly
transitioned to pressure level coordinates in unstratified regions, and follow the ocean
bottom in shallow regions like sigma coordinates. This uniquely allows HYCOM to
simulate domains with deep ocean regions as well as shelf and coastal areas.

HYCOM has been configured for the domain encompassing 18°N – 35°N and 98°W –
77°W (Figure 1) with a horizontal grid spacing of 1/25° (approximately 3.5 km) and 22
vertical layers. At the eastern and southern open boundaries, boundary conditions are
derived from a 1/12° North Atlantic simulation. The simulation can be forced by surface
winds and heat fluxes from either the NOGAPS atmospheric prediction system or the
WRF-ARW model developed in this project. Major rivers have been implemented in the
domain. The model assimilates three-dimensional data (sea surface height, temperature,
salinities, and velocities) using the NCODA (Navy Coupled Ocean Data Assimilation)
optimal interpolation technique. The real-time modeling system runs daily, and
assimilates data in this manner for a 5-day analysis period prior to running three or four
day forecasts, depending on the atmospheric model used for forcing.

The WRF-ARW has been configured over the domain of the HYCOM ocean model to
provide atmospheric forcing fields for the HYCOM, supply initial and boundary
conditions to very high-resolution atmospheric models over Florida and its coastal
regions, and to study local air-sea interaction and meteorology. WRF-ARW is a fully
compressible, Eulerian and nonhydrostatic atmospheric model that uses terrain-following,
hydrostatic-pressure vertical coordinates. The WRF-ARW is applied at 4km horizontal
resolution and nested within the NOAA-NCEP operational North American Mesoscale
(NAM) weather model. The 4km WRF-ARW model provides daily analyses and 84-
hour forecasts.

The HYCOM model replicates the large-scale features of the regional ocean circulation
well, in particular the Loop Current, Florida Current, Gulf Stream System and mesoscale
eddies (Figure 1). A closer view of the Florida region (Figure 2) shows the fine-scale
processes that can be simulated with the modeling system. For example, a series of
cyclonic frontal eddies can be clearly seen along the eastern edge of the Loop Current
and an intrusion of cold water along the Florida eastern coast can be seen wedging

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southward between the coast and the thermal front of the Florida Current. Instabilities
along this front are also evident. These large and small scale features match well with
satellite-derived sea surface temperature analyses produced by ROFFS Forecasting
Service as a collaborative FLCOOS project (Figure 3).

Figure 1. Sea surface temperature and currents from the HYCOM near real-time
simulation on 5 May 2008.

The WRF-ARW atmospheric modeling system provides very high-resolution

atmospheric analyses and forecasts over the region. For validation purposes, the
modeling system has been run for time periods of important recent weather events to test
and demonstrate its utility. An example of a strong rainfall event corresponding with the
passage of a vigorous cold front and subsequent cold air outbreak in December of 2007
shows the model’s capability (Figure 4).

The fields from the modeling system are made available via the HYCOM data server
accessible from the HYCOM project home page www.hycom.org and the GODAE
(Global Ocean Data Assimilation Experiment) server.

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Figure 2. Expanded view of the Florida region of the HYCOM model showing surface
temperature and currents on 5 May 2008.

Figure 3. Satellite-derived sea surface temperature analysis on 5 May 2008 produced by

ROFFS Forecasting Service as part of this collaborative project with FLCOOS. Note the
different color scale from Figure 2.

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Figure 4. Accumulated precipitation over the model 84-hour forecast period for 18
December 2007 showing significant heavy rainfall over Florida and the coastal waters.

Acknowledgements
This project was made possible by the Florida Coastal Ocean Observing System
Consortium and was funded by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection
contract #RM078 on the recommendation of the Florida Oceans and Coastal Council.

References
Bleck, R. (2002). An oceanic general circulation model framed in hybrid isopycnic-
cartesian coordinates. Ocean Modelling, 4, 55-88.
Chassignet, E.P., L.T. Smith, G.R. Halliwell, Clayson, C.A., J. A. Curry, and R. Bleck
(2003): North Atlantic simulations with the HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model
(HYCOM): Impact of the vertical coordinate choice, reference density, and
thermobaricity.C. W. Fairall (1996), Evaluation of turbulent fluxes at the ocean
surface using surface renewal theory. J. Phys. Oceanogr., 33, 2504-2526Geophys.
Res., 101, 28,503-28,513.
Chassignet, Ek, M. B., K.E.P., H. Mitchell, Y. Lin, E. Hurlburt, O.M. Smedstad, C.N.
Barron, D.S. Ko, R.C. Rhodes, J.F. Shriver, A.J. Wallcraft, and R.A. Arnone (2005):
Assessment of ocean prediction systems in the Gulf of Mexico using ocean color. In
"Circulation in the Gulf of Mexico: Observations and models", W. Sturges and A.
Lugo-Fernadez, Eds., AGU Monograph Series, 161, 87-100.

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Chassignet, E.P., H.E. Hurlburt, O.M. Smedstad, G.R. Halliwell, A.Rogers, P.

Grunmann, V. Koren, G. Gayno, and J.D. Tarpley, (2003), Implementation of Noah
land surface model advances in the National Centers for Environmental Prediction
operational mesoscale Eta model.
Halliwell, G. (2004): Evaluation of vertical coordinate and vertical mixing algorithms in
the HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM). Ocean Modelling, 7, 285-322.