CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM DRIVES DISAGREEMENT AMONG BRAZILIAN VEGETATION MAPS AT A SAMPLE AREA OF THE SEMIARID CAATINGA

This study evaluated the performance of 36 CMIP5 GCMs in simulating seasonal precipitation and maximum and minimum temperature over Pakistan using spatial metrics (SPAtial EFficiency, fractions skill score, Goodman–Kruskal's lambda, Cramer's V, Mapcurves, and Kling–Gupta efficiency) for the period 1961–2005. NorESM1-M, MIROC5, BCC-CSM1-1, and ACCESS1-3 were identified as the most suitable GCMs for simulating all three climate variables over Pakistan.

Our work addresses a key challenge in earth system modelling: how to optimally exploit the information contained in satellite remote sensing observations in the calibration of such models. For this we thoroughly test a number of measures that quantify the fit between an observed and a simulated spatial pattern. We acknowledge the difficulties associated with such a comparison and suggest using measures that regard multiple aspects of spatial information, i.e. magnitude and variability.

Satellite data offer great opportunities to improve spatial model predictions by means of spatially oriented model evaluations. In this study, satellite images are used to observe spatial patterns of evapotranspiration at the land surface. These spatial patterns are utilized in combination with streamflow observations in a model calibration framework including a novel spatial performance metric tailored to target the spatial pattern performance of a catchment-scale hydrological model.