Knut A. Liseter, Nansen Environmental Center
This presentation will demonstrate the coupling of HYCOM to a dynamic-thermodynamic sea ice model developed at NERSC. The sea ice model consists of a thermodynamic model, which calculates melt/freeze rates of the ice, and solves the vertical heat equation in the ice itself. The sea ice model also describes the ice thickness distribution by treating the ice as a collection of different ice thickness categories. A kinematic model describes the so-called ridging and rafting processes which occur within the ice, where these effects redistribute ice between the different ice thickness categories. The final element of the sea ice model is the EVP dynamics model which handles the movement of ice due to atmospheric, oceanic and internal ice forces.
The thermodynamic and kinematic modules of the model have been set up on the same grid as HYCOM, allowing it to utilize the same parallel communication routines as used in HYCOM. The EVP model is given on a separate grid formulation (CICE). The ice model can be easily tuned to user specification, by specifying the number of ice categories, their ice thickness limits, and the number of vertical layers for each ice thickness category.
Results will be presented from a model run, along with comparison against observations.