Reviewing model evaluation tools and their potential use for assessing climate impact model outputs

The use of existing Quality assessment tools as an automatic framework for the ISIMIP models could support modelling activities and coordination between modelling teams through the umbrella of PROCLIAS. An initial review of existing tools showed us the corresponding potential.

by Emmanuel Nyenah and Hannes Müller Schmied


Our findings from first insights in the application and modification of two studied quality assessment tools (ILAMB and ESMValTool) showed potential use of ILAMB for model evaluation within the ISIMIP framework (see Technical Documentation and the corresponding presentation. This tool has interesting functionalities such global and regional benchmarking, code development flexibility and to include external reference data. Aside from the individual model evaluation, this tool also supports model intercomparison. ILAMB has been modified to include sector-specific metrics such as KGE and NSE in addition to the default metrics for benchmarking analysis. The tool also allows for model evaluation with defined domain of interest but will require further code development for basin specific benchmarking which is key for hydrological applications.

Due to technical limitation to transform ISIMIP model output to be compliant with ESMValTool, this tool could not be used within the grant period. Also sector specific metric added to ILAMB show results in the console rather than in the result webpage.

In the next time we would like to set up a process to collect further ideas and derive specific steps as well as a collaborative working environment to work towards an automatic quality assessment tool. If you are interested to join this activities, please contact TG 1.2.