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Title: A case study of the Weather Research and Forecasting model applied to the Joint Urban 2003 tracer field experiment. Part 2: Gas tracer dispersion

Journal Article · · Boundary-Layer Meteorology
 [1];  [1];  [1];  [2];  [3];  [2];  [4]
  1. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
  2. Aeris, Louisville, CO (United States)
  3. Citadel, Chicago, IL (United States)
  4. Science and Technology in Atmospheric Research (STAR) LLC, Boulder, CO (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

Here, the Quick Urban & Industrial Complex (QUIC) atmospheric transport, and dispersion modelling, system was evaluated against the Joint Urban 2003 tracer-gas measurements. This was done using the wind and turbulence fields computed by the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. We compare the simulated and observed plume transport when using WRF-model-simulated wind fields, and local on-site wind measurements. Degradation of the WRF-model-based plume simulations was cased by errors in the simulated wind direction, and limitations in reproducing the small-scale wind-field variability. We explore two methods for importing turbulence from the WRF model simulations into the QUIC system. The first method uses parametrized turbulence profiles computed from WRF-model-computed boundary-layer similarity parameters; and the second method directly imports turbulent kinetic energy from the WRF model. Using the WRF model’s Mellor-Yamada-Janjic boundary-layer scheme, the parametrized turbulence profiles and the direct import of turbulent kinetic energy were found to overpredict and underpredict the observed turbulence quantities, respectively. Near-source building effects were found to propagate several km downwind. These building effects and the temporal/spatial variations in the observed wind field were often found to have a stronger influence over the lateral and vertical plume spread than the intensity of turbulence. Correcting the WRF model wind directions using a single observational location improved the performance of the WRF-model-based simulations, but using the spatially-varying flow fields generated from multiple observation profiles generally provided the best performance.

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-06NA25396
OSTI ID:
1331258
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1394990
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-14-29367; LA-UR-17-27317
Journal Information:
Boundary-Layer Meteorology, Journal Name: Boundary-Layer Meteorology; ISSN 0006-8314
Publisher:
SpringerCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 16 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (23)

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Cited By (2)

A New Scheme for the Simulation of Microscale Flow and Dispersion in Urban Areas by Coupling Large-Eddy Simulation with Mesoscale Models journal December 2017
Urban Dispersion Modelling Capabilities Related to the UDINEE Intensive Operating Period 4 journal November 2018

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Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Quick Urban and Industrial Complex modelling system
Transport and dispersion
Weather Research and Forecasting model