asked to cite this paper alongside with the Software doi (doi:10.17874/ac8548f0315) and version number. In addition, ESMValTool will be further developed in a version controlled repository that is accessible only to the development team. Regular releases are planned for the future. The wider climate community is encouraged to contribute to this effort and to join the ESMValTool development team for contribution of additional more in-depth diagnostics for ESM evaluation. A wiki page for the development that describes ongoing developments is also available. Interested users and developers are welcome to contact the lead author.

**The Supplement related to this article is available online at doi:10.5194/gmd-9-1747-2016-supplement.**

*Acknowledgements.* The development of the ESMValTool (v1.0) was funded by the European Commission's 7th Framework Programme, under Grant Agreement number 282672, the "Earth system Model Bias Reduction and assessing Abrupt Climate change (EMBRACE)" project and the DLR "Earth System Model Validation (ESMVal)" and "Klimarelevanz von atmosphärischen Spurengasen, Aerosolen und Wolken: Auf dem Weg zu EarthCARE und MERLIN (KliSAW)" projects. In addition, financial support for the development of ESMValTool (v1.0) was provided by ESA's Climate Change Initiative Climate Modelling User Group (CMUG). We acknowledge the World Climate Research Program's (WCRP's) Working Group on Coupled Modelling (WGCM), which is responsible for CMIP, and we thank the climate modelling groups for producing and making available their model output. For CMIP the US Department of Energy's Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison provides coordinating support and led development of software infrastructure in partnership with the Global Organization for Earth System Science Portals. We thank Björn Brötz (DLR, Germany) for his help with the release of the ESMValTool and Clare Enright (UEA, UK) for support with development of the ocean biogeochemistry diagnostics. We are grateful to Patrick Jöckel (DLR, Germany), Ron Stouffer (GFDL, USA) and to the two anonymous referees for their constructive comments on the manuscript.

The article processing charges for this open-access publication were covered by a Research Centre of the Helmholtz Association.

Edited by: S. Easterbrook

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