A Generative Super‐Resolution Model for Enhancing Tropical Cyclone Wind Field Intensity and Resolution

Abstract Extreme winds associated with tropical cyclones (TCs) can cause significant loss of life and economic damage globally, highlighting the need for accurate, high‐resolution modeling and forecasting for wind. However, due to their coarse horizontal resolution, most global climate and weather models suffer from chronic underprediction of TC wind speeds, limiting their use for impact analysis and energy modeling. In this study, we introduce a cascading deep learning framework designed to downscale high‐resolution TC wind fields given low‐resolution data. Our approach maps 85 TC events from ERA5 data (0.25° resolution) to high‐resolution (0.05° resolution) observations at 6‐hr intervals. The initial component is a debiasing neural network designed to model accurate wind speed observations using ERA5 data. The second component employs a generative super‐resolution strategy based on a conditional denoising diffusion probabilistic model (DDPM) to enhance the spatial resolution and to produce ensemble estimates. The model is able to accurately model intensity and produce realistic radial profiles and fine‐scale spatial structures of wind fields, with a percentage mean bias of −3.74% compared to the high‐resolution observations. Our downscaling framework enables the prediction of high‐resolution wind fields using widely available low‐resolution and intensity wind data, allowing for the modeling of past events and the assessment of future TC risks.

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Publication Details

Journal
Journal of Geophysical Research Machine Learning and Computation
Published
2024-11-20
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1029/2024jh000375
Citations
6
Primary Topic
Tropical and Extratropical Cyclones Research
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
2.26

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article

A Generative Super‐Resolution Model for Enhancing Tropical Cyclone Wind Field Intensity and Resolution

Joseph W. Lockwood, Pierre Gentine, Avantika Gori
6 citations
Journal of Geophysical Research Machine Learning and Computation
Tropical and Extratropical Cyclones Research
2.26
article

A Generative Super‐Resolution Model for Enhancing Tropical Cyclone Wind Field Intensity and Resolution

Joseph W. Lockwood, Pierre Gentine, Avantika Gori
article en
6 citations

Abstract

Abstract Extreme winds associated with tropical cyclones (TCs) can cause significant loss of life and economic damage globally, highlighting the need for accurate, high‐resolution modeling and forecasting for wind. However, due to their coarse horizontal resolution, most global climate and weather models suffer from chronic underprediction of TC wind speeds, limiting their use for impact analysis and energy modeling. In this study, we introduce a cascading deep learning framework designed to downscale high‐resolution TC wind fields given low‐resolution data. Our approach maps 85 TC events from ERA5 data (0.25° resolution) to high‐resolution (0.05° resolution) observations at 6‐hr intervals. The initial component is a debiasing neural network designed to model accurate wind speed observations using ERA5 data. The second component employs a generative super‐resolution strategy based on a conditional denoising diffusion probabilistic model (DDPM) to enhance the spatial resolution and to produce ensemble estimates. The model is able to accurately model intensity and produce realistic radial profiles and fine‐scale spatial structures of wind fields, with a percentage mean bias of −3.74% compared to the high‐resolution observations. Our downscaling framework enables the prediction of high‐resolution wind fields using widely available low‐resolution and intensity wind data, allowing for the modeling of past events and the assessment of future TC risks.

Journal of Geophysical Research Machine Learning and ComputationVol. 1(4)
U.S. National Science Foundation (US), Rice University (US), Columbia University (US)
National Science Foundation
Climate action
Openalex Percentile: Top 12%
Tropical and Extratropical Cyclones Research
2.26
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