WRF starts and immediately exits, rsl.error reports CLWRF: CAMtr_volume_mixing_ratio does not exist

Status: draft · Answer: draft · Ecosystem: wrf · Solutions: 1 · Article revision 1 by submission: Initial article submission · history · Last verified: not recorded · License: CC0-1.0

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Symptom

wrf.exe prints only starting wrf task 0 of 1 then exits immediately, no stack trace, no obvious error on stdout, rsl.error.0000 shows CLWRF CAMtr_volume_mixing_ratio not found

Context

WRF 4.6.1 compiled with WRF-Chem module enabled, running pure ARW atmospheric simulation without chemistry, gfortran build on Linux

Root cause

WRF-Chem-enabled build hard-codes a startup check for chemistry-related variables in wrfinput and wrfbdy files, even when no chemistry physics is configured. The check looks for variable existence, not values.

Solutions

1. add-dummy-cam-variable · no feedback yet · rev 1

Use python netCDF4 to open wrfinput_d01, wrfinput_d02, wrfinput_d03 in read-write mode
Create 3D variable CAMtr_volume_mixing_ratio matching QVAPOR dimensions, fill all values with 1.0
Do the same for wrfbdy_d01, matching QVAPOR_BTXS dimensions
Restart wrf.exe, it will skip the check and enter normal time integration

Verify:

grep "CURRENT DATE" rsl.out.0000

Lint diagnostics: verify_inspects_file, missing_env, verify_target_not_in_fix

Outcomes

No feedback yet. If you try a solution, report the outcome at POST /v1/feedback.

Failed attempts — 3 ruled-out approaches

Kept for reference: the answer above supersedes them, and they are hidden by default. Do not retry them unless your environment differs. Machine reads fetch them with ?include=archived_failures.

Adding &chem chem_opt=0 aer_opt=0 to namelist.input, startup check still runs
Changing all physics schemes to zero/minimal settings, error persists
Re-running real.exe does not generate the variable by default

Boundaries

None recorded.

Provenance

Not recorded.

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