FedRAIN-Lite: Federated Reinforcement Algorithms for Improving Idealised Numerical Weather and Climate Models

Sub-grid parameterisations in climate models are traditionally static and tuned offline, limiting adaptability to evolving states. This work introduces FedRAIN-Lite, a federated reinforcement learning (FedRL) framework that mirrors the spatial decomposition used in general circulation models (GCMs) by assigning agents to latitude bands, enabling local parameter learning with periodic global aggregation. Using a hierarchy of simplified energy-balance climate models, from a single-agent baseline (ebm-v1) to multi-agent ensemble (ebm-v2) and GCM-like (ebm-v3) setups, we benchmark three RL algorithms under different FedRL configurations. Results show that Deep Deterministic Policy Gradient (DDPG) consistently outperforms both static and single-agent baselines, with faster convergence and lower area-weighted RMSE in tropical and mid-latitude zones across both ebm-v2 and ebm-v3 setups. DDPG's ability to transfer across hyperparameters and low computational cost make it well-suited for geographically adaptive parameter learning. This capability offers a scalable pathway towards high-complexity GCMs and provides a prototype for physically aligned, online-learning climate models that can evolve with a changing climate. Code accessible at https://github.com/p3jitnath/climate-rl-fedrl.

RAIN: Reinforcement Algorithms for Improving Numerical Weather and Climate Models

This study explores integrating reinforcement learning (RL) with idealised climate models to address key parameterisation challenges in climate science. Current climate models rely on complex mathematical parameterisations to represent sub-grid scale processes, which can introduce substantial uncertainties. RL offers capabilities to enhance these parameterisation schemes, including direct interaction, handling sparse or delayed feedback, continuous online learning, and long-term optimisation. We evaluate the performance of eight RL algorithms on two idealised environments: one for temperature bias correction, another for radiative-convective equilibrium (RCE) imitating real-world computational constraints. Results show different RL approaches excel in different climate scenarios with exploration algorithms performing better in bias correction, while exploitation algorithms proving more effective for RCE. These findings support the potential of RL-based parameterisation schemes to be integrated into global climate models, improving accuracy and efficiency in capturing complex climate dynamics. Overall, this work represents an important first step towards leveraging RL to enhance climate model accuracy, critical for improving climate understanding and predictions. Code accessible at https://github.com/p3jitnath/climate-rl.