Current Research Projects

Mechanisms of Southwestern US Drought

I am currently working on understanding the drivers of prolonged (multi-year) droughts in the Southwestern United States. Periods of intense drought have been well documented in the Southwest, and a lot of work has been done showing that the ocean can have a profound influence on atmospheric circulation and associated droughts; but it is not yet clear whether or not ocean dynamics are required to create the types of droughts we see in the tree ring record. Rather, it is possible that variability internal to the atmosphere could create changes to precipitation comparable to those associated with changes to ocean conditions. I am running dedicated control experiments with the NCAR Community Earth System Model (CESM) with and without ocean coupling to examine the changes to atmospheric circulation patterns associated with drought, and the statistics of the events which occur in each simulation.

Response of the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) to Climate Change in IPCC Models

Part of my PhD work focused on the impact of anthropogenic climate warming on ENSO dynamics. Since the oscillation varies in strength from decade to decade, it has been shown that you need to observe ENSO for several centuries to be sure that you have seen the majority of what it is expected to do. And in the climate change case, the background climate is decidedly not stable: this turns out to mean that you cannot be sure that changes to ENSO will become significant on timescales of a century. Our investigation of climate change in the NCAR Community Climate Sytem Model version 4 (CCSM4) has now been accepted by the Journal of Climate: Stevenson et al. (2012) and a follow-up study using all the CMIP5 models has been accepted by Geophysical Research Letters: Stevenson, 2012ó

Dynamical Controls on ENSO

Although the climate change problem is hard to understand, one can simplify the situation using model simulations to try to identify the major physical processes driving ENSO changes. I have diagnosed output from several equilibrated simulations with the CCSM3.5, to look at changes due to CO2 increases in the absence of other complicating effects. I am particularly interested in the role of changes to the wind-driven circulation and their impact on ENSO variability and the seasonal cycle. My paper on the CCSM3.5 simulations has now been accepted by the Journal of Climate.
The online version of the paper may be found here: Stevenson et al. (2012b).

Using Paleoclimate Records for Model Validation

An often-cited goal of paleoclimate research is to extend the temporal baseline of observations further back into the past, to improve model validation efforts and therefore make future projections more reliable. But no perfect recorder of past climates exists, meaning that we have to work with the tools available from nature. As part of my IRP-funded project, I am working with Helen McGregor and Steven Phipps of the Universities of Wollongong and New South Wales on quantifying the limitations of coral oxygen isotope records in reconstructing the past amplitude of ENSO. We have found that including the seasonal cycle in oxygen isotope variability improves the accuracy of predicting oxygen isotopic composition of corals based on instrumental data. The manuscript on this topic has been submitted to Paleoceanography: Stevenson et al. (2013a)

ENSO Event Statistics and Predictability

Using coupled climate models, we can only run a certain number of ensemble members since the model simulations are each so expensive. I have developed a new statistical model for ENSO which can reproduce the gross statistical properties of coupled model output, to look at changes to the event statistics under global warming scenarios. I have found that although the overall strength of ENSO does not change significantly (see above), La Nina events may tend to become stronger in future climates.
This work is under review at the Journal of Geophysical Research-Oceans.