Metafor: Common metadata for climate modelling digital repositories

A poster about common metadata for climate modelling repositories. More people than ever now have a need to discover the results of climate models in order to prepare for and mitigate against the potentially severe impacts of global climate change. But climate modelling is a complex process, which requires accurate and complete metadata (data describing data) in order to identify, assess and use the climate data stored in digital repositories. Simulations have a key role in constructing understanding and producing predictions in climate science. But it can be difficult to discriminate between two simulations, even when you were responsible for producing them! Existing documentation currently revolves around (at best) the runtime, but not the scientific detail and relevance of the model components. There is little or no documentation of the “simulation context” (the whys and wherefores and issues associated with any particular simulation)