A Formulation of a Three-Dimensional Spectral Model for the Primitive Equations

Abstract

In the discretization of the primitive equations for numerical calculations, a formulation of a three-dimensional spectral model that uses the spectral method not only in the horizontal direction but also in the vertical direction is proposed. In this formulation, the Legendre polynomial expansion is used for the vertical discretization. It is shown that semi-implicit time integration can be efficiently done under this formulation. Then, a numerical model based on this formulation is developed and several benchmark numerical calculations proposed in previous studies are performed to show that this implementation of the primitive equations can give accurate numerical solutions with a relatively small degrees of freedom in the vertical discretization. It is also shown that, by performing several calculations with different vertical degrees of freedom, a characteristic property of the spectral method is observed in which the error of the numerical solution decreases rapidly when the number of vertical degrees of freedom is increased. It is also noted that an alternative to the sponge layer can be devised to suppress the reflected waves under this formulation, and that a “toy” model can be derived as an application of this formulation, in which the vertical degrees of freedom are reduced to the minimum.