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Operational Wave Forecast Selection in the Atlantic Ocean Using Random Forests

The existence of multiple wave forecasts leads to the question of which one should be used in practical ocean engineering applications. Ensemble forecasts have emerged as an important complement to deterministic forecasts, with better performances at mid-to-long ranges; however, they add another option to the variety of wave predictions that are available nowadays. This study developed random forest (RF) postprocessing models to identify the best wave forecast between two National Centers for Environmental Protection (NCEP) products (deterministic and ensemble). The supervised learning classifier was trained using National Data Buoy Center (NDBC) buoy data and the RF model accuracies were analyzed as a function of the forecast time. A careful feature selection was performed by evaluating the impact of the wind and wave variables (inputs) on the RF accuracy. The results showed that the RF models were able to select the best forecast only in the very short range using input information regarding the significant wave height, wave direction and period, and ensemble spread. At forecast day 5 and beyond, the RF models could not determine the best wave forecast with high accuracy; the feature space presented no clear pattern to allow for successful classification. The challenges and limitations of such RF predictions for longer forecast ranges are discussed in order to support future studies in this area.