PCHES-IAMDDI

Research in Integrated Modeling System Development, Testing, Intercomparison, and Diagnostics

award: DOE Grant DE-SC005171

active: 2010–2017

principal investigator: John Weyant (Stanford)

PCHES-IAMDDI was a research project focused on Integrated Model development, diagnostics, and inter-comparisons. PCHES-IAMDDI was the first major DOE-funded project of the PCHES research consoritium. The project’s research focused on the areas of:

  • science and technology
  • impacts and adaptation
  • regional integrated modeling
  • key energy-related intersecting systems
  • uncertainty

PCHES-IAMDDI was dedicated to improving the science of integrated modeling by performing cutting-edge research in critical areas of coupled model development. The program then further incorporated that research with model inter-comparison and integrated model scenario ensemble construction activities. The project has been very closely linked to other earth system research programs in the U.S. and abroad, which kept it responsive to the needs of the MSD teams, highly transparent, and credible. Each research area, as well as the model comparison and ensemble construction work, was broken down to fundamental principals to help set focused priorities for the individual research efforts.

The first three years of work focused on:

  • advancing progress on selected major scientific challenges in the field of integrated modeling
  • advancing methods and capabilities for inter-model testing and diagnostics
  • enhancing capabilities for multi-model, “ensemble-like” analyses for improved insights in science studies and analyses

Through this we identified three major focus areas for the last two years of the project:

  • integrated weather hazard impacts modeling
  • integrated model component emulation
  • characterizing and representing uncertainty

The essence of PCHES-IAMDDI was in organizing and executing parallel efforts and research coordination which requires bringing researchers, different groups of experts, and various disciplines together in productive ways that aimed to advance the entire field of integrated modeling.