Typically, the climatological input to DHI models is comprised of observed records of rainfall, temperature and sea level. However, DHI has increasingly fielded enquiries regarding the potential effects of future climate change. Applying climate scenarios to physically-based models provides the most reliable means we have today of evaluating the impacts of future climate change.
The central question is therefore “what influence might climate change have on the model’s output?”
A new software package developed by the International Global Change Institute of the University of Waikato in New Zealand can help answer this question. The Institute, through its commercial arm CLIMsystems, has developed SimCLIM, a computer model for examining the effects of climate variability and change over time and space. SimCLIM is designed to allow the user to integrate, manipulate and analyse spatial and time-series climate data and to run attachable climate-driven impact models (e.g. for hydrology, agricultural crops, or invasive weeds or pests). Importantly, at the core of the SimCLIM System is a flexible, user-friendly capacity for generating scenarios of future climate change. For this purpose, the software database includes the results of a range of recognised General Circulation Models and IPCC scenarios. Using the MIKE Zero Time series Objects model, the SimCLIM developers have incorporated a batch processing tool to allow the user to perturb one or more MIKE Zero time series (.dfs0 or .dt0) directly, based on climate change scenarios generated by the user of the SimCLIM system. This component of the software has been developed in cooperation with DHI’s New Zealand office. For more information see http://www.climsystems.com/site/home/ or contact Peter Urich at CLIMsystems info@climsystems.com, Mike Butts at mib@dhigroup.com, DHI Denmark or Terry van Kalken at tvk@dhigroup.com, DHI New Zealand.
