The wider domain Scottish Shelf Model

The wider domain Scottish Shelf Model (SSM) domain covers the Scottish continental shelf at relatively high resolution but also covers most of UK waters, the North Sea and the English Channel. The domain extends from approximately 48° - 62° N and 13° W - 13° E. The model grid is unstructured with spatially variable horizontal resolution, with up to 1 km node spacing at the coastline.

This wider domain model was designed to cover the whole of Scottish waters, and has the highest resolution and has been validated for this region. A number of higher resolution sub-models have also been created and are typically nested within the wider SSM.

Until recently the main output from the wider domain SSM was a one year model run with climatological forcing. These climatological forcing data were derived from other long (25 year) model runs, which have been averaged to form a climatology. The latest present day climatology version is 2.01 which represents average conditions over 1990 – 2014. The climatology has a 1993 tidal component included. As part of another project (EcotWatt2050) a future climatology representing 2038-2062 was created (SSM 2.02).

There is now a 27 year reanalysis of the SSM, performed by the National Oceanography Centre, and this is available for download from the Scottish Shelf Waters Reanalysis Service (SSW-RS).

This information page is part of the theme: 
The Scottish Shelf Model domain and unstructured grid node spacing.