NCEP GFS Column Physics Module Physics subroutines were split from the GFS model for building a physics module that can be coupled to any dynamical cores that have unstructured meshes. A driver and interface subroutines were written to enable the execution of the physics module in a single column model, which can run multiple columns simultaneously using openMP. ESMF and its global state variables were stripped off from the physics module. A few new variables and subroutines were added to properly allocate data such as ozone production coefficients and solar zenith angles etc to unstructured meshes. The “namelist” coming from the operational GFS is used for controlling tunable parameters. Fanglin Yang, NOAA/NCEP/EMC

NCEP GFS Column Physics Module Test: the column module was initialized with T574L64 GFS initial conditions and run at 100 points, randomly selected over the globe, for 10 days. The time step is 2 minutes for all physical processes except for radiation which has a time step of one hour. The column module was run without dynamics and the surface cycle. T, U, V, O3, Q, CLW are updated by the integration. Pressure at model layers and surface pressure are not updated. The following few slides show the time evolution in the first 5 days of forecast at two points, one over a land point and the other over an ocean point.

Large diurnal cycle near the surface over land

2m temperature