NSF Org:	OPP Office of Polar Programs (OPP)
Recipient:	UNIVERSITY CORPORATION FOR ATMOSPHERIC RESEARCH
Initial Amendment Date:	September 10, 2015
Latest Amendment Date:	September 10, 2015
Award Number:	1443652
Award Instrument:	Standard Grant
Program Manager:	Paul Cutler pcutler@nsf.gov  (703)292-4961 OPP  Office of Polar Programs (OPP) GEO  Directorate for Geosciences
Start Date:	September 15, 2015
End Date:	August 31, 2016 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount:	$116,288.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date:	$116,288.00
Funds Obligated to Date:	FY 2015 = $116,288.00
History of Investigator:	Marika Holland (Principal Investigator) mholland@ucar.edu Jesse Johnson (Co-Principal Investigator) William Lipscomb (Co-Principal Investigator) Mariana Vertenstein (Co-Principal Investigator)
Recipient Sponsored Research Office:	University Corporation For Atmospheric Res 3090 CENTER GREEN DR BOULDER CO  US  80301-2252 (303)497-1000
Sponsor Congressional District:	02
Primary Place of Performance:	National Center for Atmospheric Research 1850 Table Mesa Drive Boulder CO  US  80305-5602
Primary Place of Performance Congressional District:	02
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI):	YEZEE8W5JKA3
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s):	ANS-Arctic Natural Sciences, ANT Integrated System Science
Primary Program Source:	0100XXXXDB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s):	1079
Program Element Code(s):	528000, 529200
Award Agency Code:	4900
Fund Agency Code:	4900
Assistance Listing Number(s):	47.078

ABSTRACT

Mass loss (primarily melting and iceberg discharge) from land ice is accelerating and will soon become the dominant contribution to long-term sea level rise. Accurate, physically-based projections of land-ice change are needed to assess the threats to coastal regions. While progress has been made, uncertainty still exists in sea level rise projections for the 21st century and beyond. This is in part because the models used for climate projections have traditionally incorporated very simple treatments of land ice. This award will allow for more accurate consideration of the role of land ice within predictive models, specifically through continued development of a sophisticated land ice component in the Community Earth System Model (CESM). One individual will work directly on the task, and will be available to train others. The Broader Impacts of this work include better predictions of sea level rise, which will provide coastal planners with better information to support the development of effective mitigation and adaptation strategies.

Specific components of this project include adding conservative, two-way coupling between ice sheets, the land, and the atmosphere into the CESM. This will allow for improved long-term simulations to assess coupled ice-sheet/climate interactions. In addition, the project will support enhancements to the CESM's snow physics model, a component needed for accurate modeling of future ice-sheet mass changes. Finally, this project will provide support for improved model infrastructure that is needed to better simulate the future evolution of the Arctic and Antarctic ice sheets, as well as better hindcasting of paleo ice sheets that can be studied as analogs for the future. Together, these activities will result in refined research tools to address the important question of future sea level rise.

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