cc: , , date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 18:00:02 -0000 from: "Andrew Watson" subject: Re: RAPID modelling subgroup to: "Eric W Wolff" , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Dear Meric I'd like to support Eric's view. As I remember it, the reason for keeping back the sum of money, and for convening the modelling group, is to do something to rectify the following problem: the programme at the moment lacks any initiative that could help to unify the disparate elements, and get at the "core" of the rapid climate change problem. At the moment, it's not so much a programme, more some interesting research projects that have some loose relevance to one another. This is important to rectify and I don't think that we should wait until the next funding round to get something underway. Do we want the subgroup to actually commission the work? I would say yes, subject to approval by the rest of the committee of course, but first we should make sure that we are not missing out people who may be able to contribute. I would recommend expanding this group to include members from U. Liverpool, possibly Proudman, UEA (but not me!) and any other centre (Imperial?) that is doing significant modelling work. Then we ask them to design the core modelling programme of RAPID, within the budgetary limit of £0.5m. It's important to have this done, either by representatives of all those groups who might materially contribute, or else by people who are entirely disinterested -- but short of getting them all from outside the UK, that is impossible to do. Cheers, Andy *********************************** Prof Andrew J. Watson email: a.watson@uea.ac.uk or : a.j.watson@uea.ac.uk phone: (44) 1603 593761 direct 1603 456161 switchboard 1603 507719 fax School of Environmental Sciences University of East Anglia NORWICH NR4 7TJ U.K. http://www.uea.ac.uk/~ajw/ajw.htm *********************************** ----- Original Message ----- From: "Eric W Wolff" To: ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; Cc: ; ; Sent: Thursday, January 23, 2003 2:17 PM Subject: Re: RAPID modelling subgroup Dear Meric, Thank you for the message. i am very happy that progress is being made on this, and that some people have agreed to serve on it. However, my impression was that the £0.5 M was for something a bit more than that. I suspect that none (or few) of the people on the group were in the room when we decided about this, so it may be necessary for others to refresh their memories about it. The two tasks you have listed require a sub-group but not a lot of money. I think the reason for setting aside such a large sum of money was that we perceived that our funding decisions had left some fundamental gaps - some areas that we felt should be being modelled but where we had rejected allcomers, and that we expected that the modeling group would recommend to us how we could commission research to fill those gaps, without waiting for the second call. I don't any more have enough of the rejected proposals that I can remember exactly which area we were concerned about, but I think it was in the rather general area of modelling scenarios for THC shutdown/changes, and the climatic impacts of such changes. (Effectively objectives 5 and especially 6, an area that you yourself identified as weak). I think we need: 1) Other SC members to say if I am right, and to refine the area to be filled; 2) To tell the subgroup whether we want them to commission the work, or (more correctly) recommend to us how the work should be commissioned Best wishes Eric ---------------------------- Eric Wolff British Antarctic Survey High Cross Madingley Road Cambridge CB3 0ET United Kingdom E-mail: ewwo@bas.ac.uk Phone: +44 1223 221491 Fax: +44 1223 221279 Alternate fax: +44 1223 362616 >>> Meric Srokosz 23/01/03 12:21:49 >>> Dear Steering Committee One of the decisions made at the last SC meeting was to put aside ú0.5M for modelling activities, but there was no time to firm up what this money is to be used for. This e-mail is to try to do that "firming up" (apologies for not getting to this sooner, as a number of you have asked me what is happening). The state of play is as follows: a) I have approached Julia, Jochem, Paul and Richard to be members of the subgroup and they have agreed. b) from the discussion at the meeting, I think that the task of the subgroup is two-fold: 1) to ensure that a suitable hierarchy of models is available for use within RAPID (this particularly related to objective 5 of the science plan) 2) to ensure that the various modelling activities in RAPID are integrated. c) with regard to data / model synthesis (objective 4), the data subgroup recommended (and the SC agreed the recommendation at the last meeting) that this should be one focus of the 2nd AO. Therefore, it seems that the modelling subgroup should not have a strong emphasis on this at this stage. I guess that the SC needs to approve the subgroup membership and agree that the proposed tasks (b above) are the correct ones for the group to pursue on behalf of the SC and RAPID. It would be helpful to have your response / views by Thursday 6th Feb (2 weeks today), so that I can press on with arranging a subgroup meeting soon and get this aspect of RAPID underway. Regards, Meric -- Dr. Meric Srokosz, Room 254/43,Southampton Oceanography Centre (SOC) Empress Dock, Southampton, SO14 3ZH, UK Tel:+44-(0)23-80596414 (direct line); Fax: +44-(0)23-80596400 e-mail: mas@soc.soton.ac.uk or M.Srokosz@soc.soton.ac.uk http://www.soc.soton.ac.uk/JRD/SAT/pers/mas.html Science Coordinator NERC Rapid Climate Change Programme http://rapid.nerc.ac.uk/