The WRF model tar file has been updated to Version 3.1 on April 9, 2009.

The WRF Pre-Processing System (WPS) has also been upgraded to Version 3.1.

Note: V3.1 WRF can use V3.0 wrfinput and wrfbdy files as long as you don't use the gravity drag option which requires new data from geogrid. Rerunning the new programs is recommended. New options have not been tested extensively. Please use with caution.

WRF Version 3.2 new features, updates and bug fixes

WRF-NMM specific updates

The distributed version of the WRF-NMM code was updated to be comparable to NCEP's operational code. The changes included:

• Output mixed layer height from MYJ PBL
• Gravity wave drag/mountain blocking
• Change in values in Ferrier microphys F_RimeF array (set to 1.0 if no ice present)
• Modified thermal roughness length in MYJ PBL (stable conditions)
• Vertically mix hydrometeor species individually
• Relaxationof exact conservation of specific humidity, TKE, and cloud water in passive advection
• Capability for prescribed motion of nests
• Make level KTS for output exchange coefficient array EXCH_H to be at the ground
• Fixed a bug (missing a factor of 2) in the nonhydrostatic advection of Z and W
• *Fixed Problem with NMM nest restarts (users are still required to restart any domain at a boundary condition time)

General updates

Phyiscs:

• NEW:
• Gravity wave drag/mountain blocking
• Thompson microphysics (from Greg Thompson of NCAR/RAL)
• WRF Double Moment schemes for 5 and 6-class microphysics (from K. Lin and S. Y. Hong of Yosei University, South Korea)
• Quasi-normal scale elimintation (QNSE) PBL and surface layer schemes (from B. Galperin [U. S. Florida) and S. Sukoriansky [Ben Gurion Univ of Israel])
• Mellor-Yamada Nakanishi Niino (MYNN) level 2.5 and level 3 PBL and MYNN surface schemes (from M. Pagowski of NOAA/GSD)
• Bougeault-Lacarrere PBL (from A. Martilli of CIEMAT, Spain)
• Building Environment Parameterization, a multi-layer urban canopy model (from A. Martilli (CIEMAT, Spain), S. Grossman-Clarke (Arizona State U), M. Tewari of NCAR)
• MODIS 20 category landuse data for Noah LSM
• RRTMG long- and short-wave radiation schemes (from M. Iacono and E. Milawer of AER)
• Fractional sea-ice and modification for snow/ice LSM physics (from BPRC of OSU)
• Deep soil temperature update and diurnal variation of SST; bucket option for precipitation (from R. Leung and X.-B. Zeng) and energy flux accumulation for regional climiate application
• Microphysics
• Goddard
• Morrison
• Lin
• PBL and surface layer physics:
• YSU
• ACM2
• Land surface and urban physics:
• Noah LSM: albedo, z0 and emissivity calculation dependent on vegetation fraction; no longer use data from LANDUSE.TBL; snow albedo change
• UCM fixes; table name changed to URBPARM.TBL
• PX LSM: albedo change and fixes, nesting fix.
• Atmospheric Radiation
• CAM: add CO2 variation; add no-leap year option; fix CO2 for shortwave; fix aerosols for longwave; add volcanic aerosol initialization for longwave-only CAM.
• Cumulus schemes:
• KF: fixed a problem introduced when adaptive time step was implemented.
• old KF: fixed a problem using -O3 -qhot optoin on IBM.

Software:

• NEW:
• ESMF 3.1
• Relax restrictions on number of processors decomposing a domain (so-called "over-decomposition")
• Extra dimensions to 4-D tracer arrays
• Improve compilation
• Break up large routines
• Use ONLY clause
• OpenMP compilation improvements
• Automatic test for NetCDF large file support
• IBM default optimization turned up
• -qhot -O3
• -DNATIVE_MASSV with -lmass and -lmassv
• Registry changes
• Package dependent allocation of state variables
• Multi-character dimspecs