January 2007

No. 7
Contents
Global Temperature 2006: Third Warmest since 1891

1

Highlights of Global Climate for 2006

1

Climate Summary in Japan for 2006

2

TCC’s Research and Development Activity in FY 2006: downscaled
probabilistic one-month prediction products for Southeast Asia

4

TCC’s Activities in 2006 and Action Plans in 2007

4

G l o b a l Te m p e ra t u re 2 0 0 6 : T h i rd Wa r m e s t s i n c e 1 8 9 1
The global surface temperature anomaly of 2006 was +0.31°C
above normal, the third highest on record since 1891.
Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) monitors the global
warming using surface temperature combined not only overland but also over the ocean (also see the article in the “TCCNews” No.3). The annual anomaly of global average surface
temperature during 2006 was +0.31 °C above normal (19712000 average) and was the third highest next only to 1998
and 2005 same as 2003 and 2002 since 1891. The annual
mean temperature over the globe has increased at a rate of
0.67 °C per 100 years (Figure 1). Focusing on after the middle of 1980s, the annual-mean temperatures were above normal for most of the years and, especially, those in last 10 years(1997 to 2006) ranked within the 11th warmest since 1891.
The annual-mean temperature has varied in different timescales ranging from a few years to several decades. The increasing trend is likely due to human activities, particularly
the emission of greenhouse gases. For more information,please refer to http://okdk.kishou.go.jp/products/gwp/temp/
ann_wld.html.

Figure 1 Annual anomalies of global average surface temperature from 1891 to 2006
The bars indicate anomalies from the climatological normal(1971-2000 average). The blue line indicates their five-year
running mean anomalies, and the red line indicates the long-term
linear trend.

(Hiroko Morooka, Climate Prediction Division)

Highlights of Global Climate for 2006
Annual mean temperatures were above normal in most of theworld. Annual precipitation amounts were below normal insoutheastern Australia and extremely light precipitations wereobserved frequently since June 2006. 23 named tropical cyclones formed in the western North Pacific in 2006 (the 19712000 average: 26.7).

2. Significant climatic events
Significant climatic events and weather disasters in 2006
are summarized below (Figure 4). Information of the numbers of fatalities is based on the reports of the press and EMDAT: The OFDA/CRED International Disaster Database(http://www.em-dat.net).
(1) Tropical cyclones in China (May to August)Typhoons “Chanchu”, “Kaemi”, “Prapiroon”, “Saomai”
and a tropical storm “Bilis” approached to or made landfall
on the southeastern part of China between May and August.
It was reported that the total number of fatalities caused bythem reached 1,400 in China.
(2) Heavy rains from Japan to the Korean Peninsula(July)In July, heavy rains related to the active Bai-u/Changma
front caused 30 and 46 fatalities in Japan and Republic ofKorea, respectively.

1. Annual mean climate
Annual mean temperatures were above normal in most of
the world, except southern Siberia and the coastal areas ofAustralia, and especially high in western Europe, eastern
North America and from China to the Middle East (Figure2). Annual precipitation amounts were above normal ineastern and western Siberia, southeastern Africa, northwestern Australia, around India and around the eastern Caribbean Sea, while they were below normal in southern Europe,
southeastern Australia, over the eastern Indian Ocean andfrom Mongolia to northern China (Figure 3).

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No.7 | January 2007

(3) Heavy rain and tropical cyclones in the Philippines(February, May, September to November)
In February, a heavy rain caused a large-scale landslidethat led to more than 1000 fatalities in southern Leyte Island(fordetails:
http://okdk.kishou.go.jp/news/
tccnews04.pdf).
Typhoons “Chanchu”, “Xangsane”,“Cimaron” and “Durian” approached or passed the Philippines in May and September to November. It was reported
that the total number of fatalities caused by typhoons
reached 1,000.
(4) Cold waves in Europe (December 2005 to January
2006)
In December 2005 and January 2006, extremely low
temperatures were observed repeatedly in Europe. In Russia and eastern Europe, it was reported that cold waves
brought 1,000 or more fatalities.
(5) Heat waves in Europe (June to July)
Heat waves in June and July brought more than 1,900

fatalities around central Europe. According to the weather
services in UK, Netherland and Germany, July 2006 was thewarmest month on record in those countries.
(6) Heavy rains in eastern Africa (August to November)
In eastern African countries, heavy rains occurred frequently between August and November and caused fatalities
and damage. Especially, in Ethiopia, it was reported that
more than 800 fatalities in August.
(7) Heat waves in US (July to August)Western and northeastern US suffered from heat waves in
July and August, respectively. It was reported that the heatwaves led to more than 180 deaths in US.
(8) Drought in Australia (since June)
Extremely light precipitation was often observed aroundsoutheastern Australia since June. It was reported that due tosevere drought, the amount of wheat harvest of 2006 was
expected to be below 40 percent of 2005 in Australia.
(Ayako Takeuchi, Climate Prediction Division)

Figure 2 Annual mean temperature anomaly in 2006
Categories are defined by normalized annual temperature anomaly
from normal (1971-2000 average).

Figure 3 Annual total precipitation ratio in 2006
Categories are defined by annual precipitation ratio to normal(1971-2000 average).

Figure 4 Significant climatic events and damage in 2006
Numerals in parentheses in the figure correspond to the respective event numbers in the section “2. Significant climatic events” of this article.

C l i m a t e S u m m a r y i n Ja p a n f o r 2 0 0 6
The annual mean temperature was above normal over whole
Japan. From December 2005 to January 2006, strong wintermonsoon persisted, bringing record snowfalls and causing serious damage on the Japan Sea side. In July, active Bai-u front,
located over Japan, brought extremely heavy rainfall and led toserious disasters in western and eastern Japan.
(1) Annual mean temperature, precipitation and sunshine

Tokyo Climate Center

2

duration (Figure 5)
The annual mean temperature was above normal in all
regions. From January to July 2006, warm and cold days
were alternately experienced at intervals of about 10 days,
and warmer-than-normal days were dominant in the rest of
the year. The annual precipitation amounts were above
normal in all regions except for the Japan Sea side area of

No.7 | January 2007

Eastern Japan and Nansei Islands where they were normal.
The annual sunshine durations were below normal in all
regions and they were remarkably below normal in the
Pacific side of Northern and Eastern Japan.

were experienced nationwide. The ends of Bai-u were later
than their normal in most regions, resulting in that summer
sunshine duration was nationwide below normal. On theother hand, hot days were dominant due to Pacific high covering Japan in August and summer mean temperature wasabove normal in all regions.
In autumn, fine and warm days were dominant nationwide due to migratory highs tending to cover and cold air
flow rarely occurring. Autumn mean temperature wasabove normal, and the western and eastern parts of Japan
experienced record-breaking warm October. The fronts,
usually causing autumn rainy spells, were also inactive, resulting in above-normal nationwide sunshine duration andremarkably little rainfall in the western and south-westernparts. On the contrary, several developed lows brought
heavy rainfalls in the northern and eastern parts leading todeluges in a short period, and tornados frequently occurredin November due to unstable atmospheric condition formedby low-level advection of wetter and warmer air. The tornado attacking Saroma town, Hokkaido district, killed nineresidents.
Warm days were also dominant in December due toweaker-than-normal winter monsoon, and the snowfall
amount in the Japan Sea side was below normal.
(Shunji Takahashi, Climate Prediction Division)(2) Seasonal climatic features (Figure 6)
Through December 2005 and the former half of January 2006, strong winter monsoon pattern continuously
appeared and brought record snowfalls in the Japan Sea
side areas. Although warm and cold days alternately appeared in the latter half of winter, the deepest snow-depth
was recorded at 23 of 339 stations observing snow-depth.
These record snowfalls brought serious damage to the society and it was named “The Heavy Snowfall in the winter2005/06” by JMA.
In spring, the fluctuation of temperature was large andspring mean temperature was near-normal in most regionsof Japan. Cold vortices and fronts tended to be active in
April and May, respectively, and these brought unusually
low sunshine duration in most regions of Japan.
The onsets of Bai-u, rainy season of Japan, were nearnormal or later-than-normal in most regions of Japan.
Bai-u front was more active than its normal and heavy
rainfalls occurred nationwide. The remarkably heavy rainfall, named “The Heavy Rainfall in July 2006” by JMA,
continued from 15th to 24th July and serious disasters

Figure 6 Five-day Running Mean Temperature Anomalies for Regions

Figure 5 Annual Climate Anomaly/Ratio over JapanS t a r t o f “ M o n t h ly H i g h l i g h t s o n C l i m a t e S y s t e m ”‘Monthly Highlights on Climate System’ is going to be
initiated in April 2007, succeeding ‘Monthly Report on Climate System’ which has been published since April 1987. It
is to be issued as a monthly bulletin in the PDF format focusing on monthly highlights of climate, atmospheric circulation and oceanographic condition. The report guides detailed information of climate monitoring and analysis on the
TCC website. Around the same time, the historic atmos-

Tokyo Climate Center

pheric circulation figures from 1979 and more useful climate diagnosis products are going to be provided on the
TCC website. JMA also has a plan to start early 2008 to
issue ‘Annual Report on Climate System’ (provisional title)
which includes topics of the extreme climate events in theworld as well as a summary of the world climate and climate
system of the year.
(Hiroshi Nakamigawa, Climate Prediction Division)

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No.7 | January 2007

T C C ’ s R e s e a r c h a n d D e ve l o p m e n t A c t i v i t y i n 2 0 0 6 :downscaled probabilistic one-month prediction products forSoutheast Asian countries —Major outcomes and futurechallenges—
In order to support the NMHSs in issuing probabilistic forecast
information that is suitable to be incorporated into decisionmaking processes, TCC has developed the downscaled probabilistic one-month prediction methods for Southeast Asian countries in cooperation with the FUJITSU FIP Corporation since2004, and successfully finalized them in January 2007.

An official of TCC had meetings with the Malaysian Meteorological Department (MMD) and the Thai Meteorological Department in January 2007. He introduced the method
and the verification results of the downscaled probabilistic
prediction products mentioned in Section 2-3 and provided
them technical documents and some sample products. It
was agreed that TCC and TMD/MMD would try to develop
some application products collaboratively under the necessary technical assistance by TCC.

1. Previous years’ achievements
In FY 2004, it was indicated that there was a possibilityof making appropriate probabilistic forecasts of Week-2
mean temperature and monthly accumulated precipitation,using JMA’s operational one-month Ensemble Prediction
System (EPS) outputs from March 2001 to February 2004.
In FY 2005, a statistical downscaling technique was developed and verified mainly for 7-day and 28-day precipitation
amounts using the high-quality and long-term daily surface
climate database and the JRA-25 data. It was found that ingeneral the multivariate regression using orographical predictor improved forecast skill, but the effect of the orographic predictor significantly differed from region to region
and from season to season.
2. Major achievements and findings in FY 2006
2-1 Improvement of the statistical downscaling technique
14-day precipitations at stations in Southeast Asia wereregressed with the 10-year extended-range ensemble hindcasts with 11 members. Then they were verified using crossvalidation technique excluding samples year by year. New
predictors, such as the MJO indices and the NINO.3 SST
index, were considered on top of the orographic predictor. It
was found the new predictors improve the prediction skill atmany stations and seasons.
2-2 Development of a prototype of probabilistic prediction products at stations
The probability density function estimation technique,which was validated in FY 2004, was applied to the downscaled prediction described in Section 2-1. Verification of
the probabilistic prediction was done on a country-bycountry basis. It was found to have significantly better skill
than the climatological one, and to have high reliability, notonly for above- or below-median probability, but also for
exceeding upper-one-third probability.
2-3 Technical transfer and collaborative developmentwith MMD and TMD

3. Remaining issues for the future
3-1 Operational provision of the downscaled probabilistic prediction products
Now that the statistical downscaling technique and theprobability density estimation method has proved to work
well, it should be considered to produce real-time prediction
products from the operational one-month EPS outputs and todisseminate them through the Internet to the NMHSs in
Southeastern Asia regularly. It would be helpful for conducting near-real-time verification and for developing some
applications out of them.
3-2 Needs for web-based application tools
It was found in the meetings with MMD and TMD thatthey would like to develop the same kind of tailored products which meet specific users’ needs by themselves. It isthought desirable to develop web-based tools which assist
the NMHSs in developing their original prediction products
by using their original observation data. Because TCC has
both statistical tools and consistent historical analysis andprediction data, such as JRA-25/JCDAS, COBE-SST andhindcasts, it would help a lot if TCC could develop a webbased analysis and prediction tools in the future.
3-3 Technical transfer of the statistical downscaling
methodIt was also revealed during the meeting with MMD and
TMD, that basic knowledge on the statistical and probabilistic methods was lacked by many of the staff in NMHSs. It
is quite important to carry out technical transfer and capacity
building meeting the needs and backgrounds of each country, in order to promote better use of this kind of new prediction product.
(Shingo Yamada, Climate Prediction Division)

TCC’s Activities in 2006 and Action Plans in 2007
TCC has formulated “Activity Report at Tokyo Climate Center in2006”, which contains climate-related activities conducted at
JMA in 2006 and TCC’s action plans in 2007. Here, main pointsof the report is introduced. The whole document will be available
at the TCC website soon.

example, in the second quarter of 2007, the downscaled prediction products are planned to be experimentally provided
through the TCC website.
2. JRA-25 and COBE-SST
The joint project between JMA and Central ResearchInstitute for Electric Power Industry on the long-term global
atmospheric reanalysis, called “Japanese 25-year Reanalysis (JRA-25)”, was finalized in March 2006. After
registration, JRA-25 data are available through the JRA-25
official website (http://jra.kishou.go.jp/index_en.html). The
JMA Climate Data Assimilation System (JCDAS), inheriting

1. TCC website and products
The TCC web server will be renewed in April 2007. In
the second quarter of 2007, its website design will be renewed and the RA-II RCC Network homepage will be
opened. It is planned to add some new monitoring, diagnosis
and prediction products sequentially to the new website. For

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No.7 | January 2007

atmosphere coupled model, named MRI-CGCM2.3. In
March 2008, both global and regional features of the projected climate and ocean currents is planned to be publishedas the “Global Warming Projection Volume 7”.
6. RCC and GPC
TCC has applied for the Regional Climate Centre (RCC)
status in WMO RA-II with its implementation plan, which isavailable at the TCC website (http://okdk.kishou.go.jp/about/
implementation_plan_2006.pdf). TCC has also applied for
the Global Producing Centre (GPC) for Long-Range Forecast(LRF) with an activity report, which is available at the WMO
website(ftp://www.wmo.int/Documents/SESSIONS/
CBS.Ext(06)/English/pdf/d06-3(3)_en.pdf).
7. Capacity building
JMA has conducted a training course in meteorology for
NMHSs’ experts every year since 1973 as one of the training
courses provided by the Japan International Cooperation
Agency (JICA). The course in 2006 is focused on operational use of numerical weather prediction, satellite meteorology and climate information. In the climate information
session, trainees were given lectures on climate system monitoring, long-range forecasting, El Niño outlook and global
warming projection and were provided practices on displaying and analyzing the forecast and analysis data. In September to December 2007, this training course will be subsequently organized.
8. International conference and workshop
JMA is going to hold an international workshop on the“Applications of Advanced Climate Information in the AsiaPacific Region” in 20-22 February 2007 in Tokyo, under the
auspices of the Ocean Policy Research Foundation, Japan.
The third WCRP international conference on reanalysis isplanned to be held in January 2008 in Tokyo.
(Shingo Yamada, Climate Prediction Division)

the data assimilation system used in the JRA-25, was implemented into operation. The Sea Surface Temperature(SST) analysis system was upgraded to the same one usedin the centennial SST reanalysis (Ishii et. al., 2005), whichis called COBE-SST.
3. Extended- and long-range EPS
The extended-range (one-month) Ensemble Prediction
System (EPS) was separated from the medium-range EPS,
and its ensemble size was increased from 26 to 50. The
atmospheric global prediction model for the extended-range
EPS was upgraded to the medium-resolution version(TL159L40) of the JMA Global Spectral Model for shortrange forecasting (GSM0507). The long-range (threemonth and warm/cold season) EPS was upgraded to the
low-resolution version (TL95L40) of the JMA Global Spectral Model for short-range forecasting (GSM0502), and its
ensemble size is planned to increase from 31 to 50 in 2007.
In 2007, the extended- and long-range EPS is planned to be
subsequently upgraded through improvements of physicalprocesses in the model and introduction of new environmental data.
4. ODAS and El Niño prediction system
MRI (Meteorological Research Institute) of JMA has
been developing a new Ocean Data Assimilation system,
named MOVE (Multivariate Ocean Variational Estimation)system, and an ocean prediction model, named MRI.COM(MRI Community Ocean Model), since 1999. The new
ocean analysis system and the ocean-atmosphere coupled
prediction system are scheduled to be implemented into
operation in March 2008.
5. Global warming projection
The projection of the atmospheric and oceanic climate
around Japan for the end of this century is under calculation
with a regional coupled ocean-atmosphere model developedin MRI/JMA and the improved version of the global ocean-U p d a t e o f J M A ’ s S e a s o n a l E n s e m bl e P re d i c t i o n S y s t e m
JMA’s extended- and long-range ensemble prediction
systems (EPS) are scheduled to be upgraded in March and in
the middle of 2007, respectively. Regarding the global atmospheric prediction model used in the extended-range
EPS, main points to be changed are as follows:i) Update of absorption coefficient of water vapor in thesolar radiation scheme, including the continuum absorption
effect,ii) Introduction of the new climatology of aerosol opticaldepth based on satellite observation data compiled by the
Atmospheric Environment Division, JMA, andiii) Introduction of the improved cumulus convection
scheme, including trigger function and raindrop reevaporation.
It has been shown that this new model (GSM0703C) has
smaller systematic error, especially in the lower tropospherictemperature around Japan. Along with this model change,
Any comments or inquiries on this newsletter and/or
the TCC website would be much appreciated. Please email to the following address:
tcc@climar.kishou.go.jp(Chief Editor: Shingo Yamada)Tokyo Climate Center

the Breeding of Growing Modes (BGM) method, which isused for making perturbed initial condition, is going to be
improved. The improved BGM method gives smaller initial
perturbation than the current one in the tropics, and properly
takes into account instability associated with the Madden
Julian Oscillation (MJO); it is expected to improve the probabilistic forecasting skill of the MJO.
As for the upgrade of the long-range EPS, it is planned in
the middle of 2007 that the low resolution version of the
GSM0703C is introduced and the number of ensemble
members is increased to 50 from 31. In the new EPS, uncertainty in prescribed SST will be considered in addition to
uncertainty in the initial condition.
(Shuhei Maeda, Climate Prediction Division)

Tokyo Climate Center (TCC), Climate Prediction Division, JMA
Address: 1-3-4 Otemachi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100-8122, Japan
TCC website: http://okdk.kishou.go.jp/index.html

5No.7 | January 2007