Evaluation of Summer Average Circulation Simulation over East Asia by CMIP5 Climate Models

Based on 1961-2005 monthly reanalysis data of atmospheric general circulation from the NCEP data, this paper evaluates the summer atmospheric general circulations in East Asia (EA) simulated by 30 climate models in the Phase 5 of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) historical simulation experiments. Taylor figures and various assessment indicators have been used to find the models which are better in simulating summer atmospheric general circulation in EA. Results show that:1) Global climate models are able to simulate the basic features of summer average atmospheric general circulation over EA. Compared with CMIP3 models, the simulation ability of CMIP5 models have made a great improvement. Taking sea level pressure (SLP) for example, the simulated deviations are less than 6 hPa over most areas of EA. 2) Modeling abilities of general circulation for different levels are different. The simulation of 500 hPa geopotential height is the best, followed by 100 hPa geopotential height and 850 hPa wind, however, SLP is relatively poor. Compared with simulations of main circulation systems, the Indian hot low pressure and eastward extending trough intensity index are well simulated. 3) According to the performance of 30 climate models, the authors find five models which simulate the average atmospheric general circulation and the main circulation system better. They are CESM1-CAM5, MPI-ESM-MR, MPI-ESM-LR, MPI-ESM-P, and CanESM2。4) The performance of multi-model ensemble is better than any single one, however, it is weaker than the best five models ensemble mean.