A Galerkin finite element-spectral weather forecast model in hybrid coordinates (Q1104812)

An atmospheric model is presented using the spectral method for horizontal discretization and a finite element method for the vertical. The vertical coordinate is discretized in a hybrid system, being a P- system at the top of the atmosphere and a \(\sigma\)-system near the surface. For intermediate levels there is a smooth transition between the two systems. An energy-conserving scheme is obtained by using a Petrov- Galerkin method with density as a weight. An efficient method of computing the Galerkin integrals is achieved by introducing a collocation grid. The horizontal discretization uses the spectral method with spherical harmonic basis functions and triangular truncation with meridional wavenumber up to 106. A set of test forecasts was done using 19 vertical levels. The forecasts were compared to those of a model using a finite difference technique for the vertical. The finite element model showed an advantage with respect to an averaged correlation measure.