2010 Articles

Decadal Climate Predictability and Prediction: Where Are We?

Mehta, Vikram; Meehl, Gerald; Goddard, Lisa M.; Knight, Jeff; Kumar, Arun; Latif, Mojib; Lee, Tong; Rosati, Anthony; Stammer, Detlef

This brief meeting summary provides an overview of the consensus of a research community workshop on decadal climate variability (DCV) held in the fall of 2009. The consensus of the participants was that decadal climate predictions may become useful to society some time in the future, but will be highly experimental in the near future. Reflecting the increasing interest in decadal climate predictions since the previous DCV Workshop in May 2007, the main theme this time was “Decadal climate predictability and prediction: Where are we?”; the purpose was to describe and summarize the status of decadal climate nowcasting and forecasting, thus outlining a research strategy to secure the needed observations and methods to quantify predictability of DCV, and to identify unsolved science problems. Gaps in our knowledge of DCV were identified, as were areas of needed research. Recommendations in areas of predictability and prediction; observations, theory, and modeling; and societal impacts are summarized.