Tests of a robust eddy correlation system for sensible heat flux

Summary Sensible heat flux estimates from a simple, one-propeller eddy correlation system (OPEC) were compared with those from a sonic anemometer eddy correlation system (SEC). In accordance with similarity theory, the performance of the OPEC system improved with increasing height of the sensor above the surface. Flux totals from the two systems at sites with adequate fetch were in excellent agreement after frequency response corrections were applied. The propeller system appears suitable for long periods of unattended measurement. The sensible heat flux measurements can be combined with net radiation and soil heat flux measurements to estimate latent heat as a residual in the surface energy balance.With 6 Figures     

Twentieth century North Atlantic climate change. Part II: Understanding the effect of Indian Ocean warming

Ensembles of atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) experiments are used in an effort to understand the boreal winter Northern Hemisphere (NH) extratropical climate response to the observed warming of tropical sea surface temperatures (SSTs) over the last half of the twentieth Century. Specifically, we inquire about the origins of unusual, if not unprecedented, changes in the wintertime North Atlantic and European climate that are well described by a linear trend in most indices of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). The simulated NH atmospheric response to the linear trend component of tropic-wide SST change since 1950 projects strongly onto the positive polarity of the NAO and is a hemispheric pattern distinguished by decreased (increased) Arctic (middle latitude) sea level pressure. Progressive warming of the Indian Ocean is the principal contributor to this wintertime extratropical response, as shown through additional AGCM ensembles forced with only the SST trend in that sector. The Indian Ocean influence is further established through the reproducibility of results across three different models forced with identical, idealized patterns of the observed warming. Examination of the transient atmospheric adjustment to a sudden “switch-on” of an Indian Ocean SST anomaly reveals that the North Atlantic response is not consistent with linear theory and most likely involves synoptic eddy feedbacks associated with changes in the North Atlantic storm track. The tropical SST control exerted over twentieth century regional climate underlies the importance of determining the future course of tropical SST for regional climate change and its uncertainty. Better understanding of the extratropical responses to different, plausible trajectories of the tropical oceans is key to such efforts.     

Tropospheric Ozone in a Global-Scale Three-Dimensional Lagrangian Model and Its Response to NOX Emission Controls

A three-dimensional Lagrangian tropospheric chemistry modelis used toinvestigate the impact of human activities on the tropospheric distributionofozone and hydroxyl radicals. The model describes the behaviour of 50 speciesincluding methane, carbon monoxide, oxides of nitrogen, sulphur dioxide andnineorganic compounds emitted from human activities and a range of other sources.Thechemical mechanism involves about 100 chemical reactions of which 16 arephotochemical reactions whose diurnal dependence is treated in full. The modelutilises a five minute chemistry time step and a three hour advection timestepfor the 50,000 air parcels. Meteorological data for the winds, temperatures,clouds and so on are taken from the UK Meteorological Office global model for1994 onwards. The impacts of a 50% reduction in European NO_Xemissions onglobal ozone concentrations are assessed. Surface ozoneconcentrations decrease in summertime and rise in wintertime, but to differentextents.     

Probabilistic correction of RCM precipitation in the Basque Country (Northern Spain)

A parametric quantile–quantile transformation is used to correct the systematic errors of precipitation projected by regional climate models. For this purpose, we used two new probability distributions: modified versions of the Gumbel and log-logistic distributions, which fit to the precipitation of both wet and dry days. With these tools, the daily probability distribution of seven regional climate models was corrected: Aladin-ARPEGE, CLM-HadCM3Q0, HIRHAM-HadCM3Q0, HIRHAM-BCM, RECMO-ECHAM5-rt3, REMO-ECHAM-rt3 and PROMES-HadCM3Q0. The implemented method presents an error less than 5 % in the simulation of the average precipitation and 1 % in the simulation of the number of dry days. For the study area, an intensification of daily and subdaily precipitation is expected under the A1B scenario throughout the 21st century. This intensification is interpreted as a consequence of the process of ‘mediterraneanisation’ of the most southern ocean climate.     

Complex study of characteristics of a Cb cloud developing over the Arabian Peninsula under high dew point deficit in the atmosphere. Part 1. Field observations and numerical modeling

Basing on airmass motion trajectory calculations over the Arabian Peninsula on April 10, 2008, it can be assumed that in the lower and middle troposphere, zones with increased air moisture exist due to air inflow from the Red Sea. As a result, mesoscale volumes of dry and moist air are neighboring, though large-scale field is comparatively homogeneous with low humidity. In the mesoscale zones, intense thunderstorm and hailstorm Cb clouds developed, whose characteristics and evolution are studied in the paper. Continuous radar observations of the clouds are carried out during 5 hours. Numerical simulation of the cloud evolution is performed with nonstationary 1.5-dimensional model. It is noted that under the mentioned atmospheric conditions, in the area under consideration, heavy rain and hail from the Cb clouds are observed. The main factors of their origination are high thermal instability of the atmosphere and moist air inflow from outside.     

A verification framework for interannual-to-decadal predictions experiments

Decadal predictions have a high profile in the climate science community and beyond, yet very little is known about their skill. Nor is there any agreed protocol for estimating their skill. This paper proposes a sound and coordinated framework for verification of decadal hindcast experiments. The framework is illustrated for decadal hindcasts tailored to meet the requirements and specifications of CMIP5 (Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5). The chosen metrics address key questions about the information content in initialized decadal hindcasts. These questions are: (1) Do the initial conditions in the hindcasts lead to more accurate predictions of the climate, compared to un-initialized climate change projections? and (2) Is the prediction model’s ensemble spread an appropriate representation of forecast uncertainty on average? The first question is addressed through deterministic metrics that compare the initialized and uninitialized hindcasts. The second question is addressed through a probabilistic metric applied to the initialized hindcasts and comparing different ways to ascribe forecast uncertainty. Verification is advocated at smoothed regional scales that can illuminate broad areas of predictability, as well as at the grid scale, since many users of the decadal prediction experiments who feed the climate data into applications or decision models will use the data at grid scale, or downscale it to even higher resolution. An overall statement on skill of CMIP5 decadal hindcasts is not the aim of this paper. The results presented are only illustrative of the framework, which would enable such studies. However, broad conclusions that are beginning to emerge from the CMIP5 results include (1) Most predictability at the interannual-to-decadal scale, relative to climatological averages, comes from external forcing, particularly for temperature; (2) though moderate, additional skill is added by the initial conditions over what is imparted by external forcing alone; however, the impact of initialization may result in overall worse predictions in some regions than provided by uninitialized climate change projections; (3) limited hindcast records and the dearth of climate-quality observational data impede our ability to quantify expected skill as well as model biases; and (4) as is common to seasonal-to-interannual model predictions, the spread of the ensemble members is not necessarily a good representation of forecast uncertainty. The authors recommend that this framework be adopted to serve as a starting point to compare prediction quality across prediction systems. The framework can provide a baseline against which future improvements can be quantified. The framework also provides guidance on the use of these model predictions, which differ in fundamental ways from the climate change projections that much of the community has become familiar with, including adjustment of mean and conditional biases, and consideration of how to best approach forecast uncertainty.     

The formation of tropical cyclones

Summary This paper attempts a synthesis of new observations and new concepts on how tropical cyclone formation occurs. Despite many worthy observational and numerical modeling studies in recent decades, our understanding of the detailed physical processes associated with the early stages of tropical cyclone formation is still inadequate; operational forecast skill is not very high. Although theoretical ideas cover a wide range of possibilities, results of new observations are helping us to narrow our search into more specific and relevant topic areas.With 33 FiguresPrologueThis paper is dedicated to Professor Herbert Riehl under whom I studied tropical meteorology at the University of Chicago from 1957–1961 and was later associated with at Colorado State University (CSU). Professor Riehl arranged my first aircraft flights into hurricanes in the late 1950s and gave great encouragment to me to explore the secrets of what causes a tropical disturbance to be transformed into a tropical storm.Herbert would persist in asking me nearly every week or so what causes a hurricane to form? I and my graduate students and research colleagues at CSU have been working to uncover the secrets of tropical cyclone formation ever since. The following article gives my current best estimate of the primary physical processes involved with this topic.     

The Numerical Simulation on Atmospheric Transport and Dispersion of the Spray Atomized from Flood Discharging by Hydropower Station over Complex Terrain

Summary  A three-dimensional, nonhydrostatic numerical model with high spatial resolution, in which a simple energy closure scheme is employed, has been developed to simulate the spray dispersion over complex terrain. The evaporation, condensation, and dispersion of the spray and moisture are taken into account in model equations. The term of latent heat due to phase transformation is considered in detail to account for its effects on the temperature field and airflow. As an application of the model, the spray concentration and air relative humidity are calculated under neutral condition. The results indicate that under the neutral condition, the spray is transported to about 0.6 km downwind from the source, and its effects on the air humidity reach a further distance of 0.9 km downwind from the source. Attention is given to the dependence of the results upon the various factors influencing the simulation, such as the intensity of the source, the atmospheric stratification, and the dynamic factor of the terrain. Some numerical tests were carried out to provide extra insight to the effects of these factors. It has been demonstrated that the simulation results such as relative humidity and temperature are sensitive to these factors, especially to the thermal stratification. Under unstable conditions, the effects of the spray source increase significantly, and the variation extent of the temperature, relative humidity and flow field is larger than that under neutral condition. The effects of dynamic and thermal factors on the air flow field are discussed through the comparison of the modeling results over complex terrain and flat terrain. Received June 8, 1998 Revised April 17, 1999     

Some characteristics of ozone profiles above Hong Kong

Summary Analysis of ozonesonde data shows that in the lower troposphere above Hong Kong, there is a relative maximum with respect to height in all seasons except winter. In the upper troposphere, there is with respect to height a relative minimum in the seasonally averaged ozone mixing ratio in winter. Ozone mixing ratios in the upper troposphere in winter and spring can be significantly enhanced by stratospheric intrusions associated with the passage of cold fronts and upper cut-off lows.For Hong Kong, the seasonally averaged total ozone has the highest value in spring, and the lowest in winter. The seasonally averaged total tropospheric ozone also has the highest value in spring, but the lowest in summer. In a relative sense, total tropospheric ozone contributes most to the total ozone in spring and the least in summer.The phase of the total ozone anomaly above Hong Kong is influenced by the Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO), with the positive anomaly associated with the easterly phase of QBO, and the negative anomaly the westerly phase.     

On the evaluation of an integral connected with the thermonuclear reaction rate in closed form

The standard expression of the reaction rate for low-energy, nonresonant nuclear reactions in nondegenerate plasma contains a parameter-dependent integral which in all previous calculations with physical or astrophysical background is considered as not capable of being evaluated in a closed form. So one usually resorts to approximation methods concerning large values of the parameter. At first we point out that CONSUL (1964) has given a series representation of the integral which was identified with a MEIJER 's G-function by MATHAI (1971). Next, in view of a physically more exact determination of the reaction rate formula, especially in connection with calculations concerning stellar energy generation, we consider a more general integral containing the mentioned one as special case and give an approximation-free representation by means of MEIJER 's G-function. The G-function so obtained may be conceived as complex-valued continuation of CONSUL 's series representation of a certain class of integrals contained in the considered one. From the series we extract a small parameter approximation of the special integral.