Research Assistant/associate Weather Generator

**Salary**:
Research Assistant: £32,296 to £33,882 per annum

Research Associate: £34,866 to £40,247 per annum

Newcastle University is a great place to work, with excellent benefits. We have a generous holiday package; plus the opportunity to buy more, great pension schemes and a number of health and wellbeing initiatives to support you.

Closing Date: 02 February 2025

**The Role**

We are seeking a Researcher to work on the development of a weather generator to downscale climate projections over the UK and Ireland co-funded by the Climate+ Co-Centre and the DARe Hub. The Climate+ Co-Centre is a new initiative to address water challenges on the Islands of Ireland and Great Britain.

The Climate+ Co-Centre brings together over 60 leading researchers from 14 academic partner institutions in the UK over a six-year period. It will undertake research, providing evidence and urgently needed solutions for the interlinked climate change, biodiversity loss and water quality degradation crises on the islands of Ireland and Great Britain, and globally. More information about the Climate+ Co-Centre can be found here.

DARe is the National Hub for Decarbonised, Adaptable, and Resilient Transport Infrastructures - brings together 4 leading UK universities, and diverse industry, government, and civic partners. DARe’s mission is to find viable pathways and solutions for a transition to an adaptable, resilient, net zero transport system that works for all. For further information see here.

The researcher will build upon recent work which has developed an open-source weather generator model coded in python. The methodological approach for the weather generator is based upon the same approach used for the UKCP09 weather generator but the new model will also have the capacity to simulate long stochastic simulation sets for spatial outputs across catchments. The researcher will link the current weather generator to climate projections relevant for the UK and Ireland to ensure the stochastic data series capture the range of uncertainty in climate projections while correcting climate model biases. The approach will develop stochastic time series consistent with global warming levels. The researcher will also be responsible for delivering climate information needed for case studies within the DARE project, working with other postdoctoral researchers and stakeholders from industry to help develop long-term strategies for resilient and low-carbon transport infrastructure within the UK.

The position is fixed term for a period of 2 years with a view for the successful appointee to commence employment as soon as possible. The position is offered on a full-time basis (37 hours per week), based on site in Newcastle. We would be happy to discuss arrangements for flexible and/or blended working.

Interviews will be held 6th & 7th March 2025

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As part of our commitment to career development for research colleagues, the University has developed 3 levels of research role profiles. These profiles set out firstly the generic competences and responsibilities expected of role holders at each level and secondly the general qualifications and experiences needed for entry at a particular level.

**Key Accountabilities**
- Use new hourly observations of precipitation to re-calibrate the WG to better simulate high-resolution rainfall variability
- Develop distributions of future change factors from relevant climate model projections, working with other postdocs in Co-Centre and DARE
- Develop a framework and codes for integrating change factors for temperature and precipitation statistics from climate models into the WG model
- Generate gridded high-resolution stochastic data series for Ireland & the UK that capture the range of uncertainty in climate projections and metrics that deliver this information at relevant scales (e.g. catchment, administrative region)
- Work with other researchers in the Co-Centre to deliver information for an online platform to link the WG into the new climate atlas being developed for the UK and Ireland
- Work with other researchers and stakeholders within DARE to integrate climate information into case studies to help develop long-term strategies for resilient and low-carbon transport infrastructure within the UK

This project will use the latest model simulations from large ensembles including: (1) CMIP6 projections; (2) UKCP18 projections for the whole of Ireland & the UK; (3) Existing downscaled simulations of CMIP5 and CMIP6 with a specific GWL focus; (4) Regional climate projections produced by ICHEC (downscaled CMIP5&6), Met Eireann (TRANSLATE) and EURO-CORDEX; (5) Specific stabilized climate simulations.

**The Person**

**Knowledge, Skills and Experience**
- Knowledge and research experience in using climate model outputs and/or observational datasets
- Evidence of planning and organisation of research
- Experience in python coding and handlin