A sensitivity study of the Regional Climate Model (RegCM3) to the convective scheme with emphasis in central eastern and southeastern Europe

Regional climate simulations have been performed over the greater European area for 3 years using three convective parameterizations: (a) the Grell scheme with Arakawa-Schubert (AS) closure assumption, (b) the Grell scheme with Fritsch-Chappell (FC) closure assumption and (c) the MIT scheme. The comparison of the model results of near-surface temperature with near-surface temperature observations indicates a cold bias with both Grell scheme configurations. This bias is significantly reduced when the MIT convective scheme is introduced, even during months of low convective activity. The temperature differences between the Grell (with either AS or FC closure schemes) and the MIT scheme are largest in the lower troposphere, extending up to 700 hPa. In terms of total precipitation, no systematical differences between Grell and MIT schemes are observed throughout the year for the European domain but the convective portion of total precipitation is greater in the MIT scheme simulations. For the central Eastern Europe region, MIT scheme simulations generally produce more precipitation during the warm season than Grell simulations, while for the southern Eastern Europe region, the MIT precipitation enhancement is small and not systematically positive. It is evident that the cause of the differences between the convective schemes is the more intense convection in the MIT scheme configuration, which in turn imposes a more effective drying of the atmosphere, less low-level clouds, more short-wave solar radiation absorbed from the ground and hence warmer low level temperatures.