Coordinated Research in Earth Systems and Climate: Experiments, kNowledge, Dissemination and Outreach (CRESCENDO)
CRESCENDO: Advancing Earth System Models for Climate Science
CRESCENDO was a major European research project focused on improving Earth System Models (ESMs)—the most advanced tools for projecting future climate change. These models simulate the interactions between the atmosphere, oceans, land, and biosphere, helping scientists and policymakers understand how our planet responds to rising greenhouse gas emissions.
UKESM was a key component of the EU funded CRESCENDO project. CRESCENDO ran from 2015 to March 2021 and brought together 7 European Earth System Modelling (ESM) teams and 3 European Integrated Assessment Modelling (IAM) groups, with experts in ESM performance evaluation, ESM future projection analysis, climate impacts, regional downscaling and science communication, representing 10 European countries.
The CRESCENDO project, led by Prof Colin Jones from the National Centre for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) and the University of Leeds coordinated a European contribution to the 6th Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6) where the climate research community compared a range of international Earth System Models using common sets of experimental protocols, to improve our knowledge of the Earth’s climate processes and provide the best possible future projections to governments and decision-makers.
Key Achievements
- Delivered seven improved Earth system models and documented their configurations for CMIP6.
- Released ESMValTool v2.0, a global standard for model evaluation, with new diagnostics for carbon, nitrogen, and aerosol processes.
- Coordinated Europe’s contribution to ScenarioMIP, providing future climate projections for IPCC AR6. Realized simulations for: DECK, scenarioMIP, AerchemMIP, C4MIP, LUMIP, LS3MIP and OMIP.
- Published over 300 scientific papers, advancing knowledge on climate sensitivity, carbon cycle feedbacks, and emergent constraints.
- Engaged policymakers, students, and the public through outreach and platforms like ScienceBrief. The CRESCENDO schools network enabled students to artistically create novel communications related to climate change UKESM supporting European Climate Education Projects – UKESM
CRESCENDO Project and Outputs
A summary of the CRESCENDO project and its outputs are available at: Coordinated Research in Earth Systems and Climate: Experiments, kNowledge, Dissemination and Outreach on the European CORDIS website
Including over 340 science papers that were published by the project team: CRESCENDO scientific papers.
