Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory

doi:10.5194/amt-12-4931-2019

This content will become publicly available on September 11, 2020

Title: Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory

Full Record
Other Related Research

Abstract

Shallow oceanic precipitation variability is documented using three second-generation radar systems located at the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Eastern North Atlantic observatory: ARM zenith radar (KAZR2), the Ka-band scanning ARM cloud radar (KaSACR2) and the X-band scanning ARM precipitation radar (XSAPR2). First, the radar systems and measurement post-processing techniques, including sea-clutter removal and calibration against colocated disdrometer and Global Precipitation Mission (GPM) observations are described. Then, we present how a combination of profiling radar and lidar observations can be used to estimate adaptive (in both time and height) parameters that relate radar reflectivity (Z) to precipitation rate (R) in the form Z=αRβ, which we use to estimate precipitation rate over the domain observed by XSAPR2. Furthermore, constant altitude plan position indicator (CAPPI) gridded XSAPR2 precipitation rate maps are also constructed. Hourly precipitation rate statistics estimated from the three radar systems differ because KAZR2 is more sensitive to shallow virga and XSAPR2 suffers from less attenuation than KaSACR2 and as such is best suited for characterizing intermittent and mesoscale-organized precipitation. Further analysis reveals that precipitation rate statistics obtained by averaging 12 h of KAZR2 observations can be used to approximate that of a 40 km radius domain averaged over similar time periods. However,more »« less

Authors:

Lamer, K;

Publication Date:: 2019-09-11

Research Org.:: Brookhaven National Lab. (BNL), Upton, NY (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER) (SC-23)

OSTI Identifier:: 1569543

Report Number(s):: BNL-212183-2019-JAAM
Journal ID: ISSN 1867--8548

Grant/Contract Number:: SC0012704

Resource Type:: Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:: Atmospheric Measurement Techniques

Additional Journal Information:: Journal Volume: 12; Journal Issue: 9; Journal ID: ISSN 1867--8548

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

Subject:: 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES

Citation Formats


                    Lamer, K, and Kollias, Pavlos. Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory.  United States: N. p., 2019. 
        Web.  doi:10.5194/amt-12-4931-2019.

Copy to clipboard


                    Lamer, K, & Kollias, Pavlos. Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory.  United States.  doi:10.5194/amt-12-4931-2019.

Copy to clipboard


                    Lamer, K, and Kollias, Pavlos. Wed .  
        "Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory".  United States.  doi:10.5194/amt-12-4931-2019.

Copy to clipboard


                    
@article{osti_1569543,

  title        = {Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory},

  author       = {Lamer, K and Kollias, Pavlos},

  abstractNote = {Shallow oceanic precipitation variability is documented using three second-generation radar systems located at the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Eastern North Atlantic observatory: ARM zenith radar (KAZR2), the Ka-band scanning ARM cloud radar (KaSACR2) and the X-band scanning ARM precipitation radar (XSAPR2). First, the radar systems and measurement post-processing techniques, including sea-clutter removal and calibration against colocated disdrometer and Global Precipitation Mission (GPM) observations are described. Then, we present how a combination of profiling radar and lidar observations can be used to estimate adaptive (in both time and height) parameters that relate radar reflectivity (Z) to precipitation rate (R) in the form Z=αRβ, which we use to estimate precipitation rate over the domain observed by XSAPR2. Furthermore, constant altitude plan position indicator (CAPPI) gridded XSAPR2 precipitation rate maps are also constructed. Hourly precipitation rate statistics estimated from the three radar systems differ because KAZR2 is more sensitive to shallow virga and XSAPR2 suffers from less attenuation than KaSACR2 and as such is best suited for characterizing intermittent and mesoscale-organized precipitation. Further analysis reveals that precipitation rate statistics obtained by averaging 12 h of KAZR2 observations can be used to approximate that of a 40 km radius domain averaged over similar time periods. However, it was determined that KAZR2 is unsuitable for characterizing domain-averaged precipitation rate over shorter periods. But even more fundamentally, these results suggest that these observations cannot produce an objective domain precipitation estimate and that the simultaneous use of forward simulators is desirable to guide model evaluation studies.},

  doi          = {10.5194/amt-12-4931-2019},

  journal      = {Atmospheric Measurement Techniques},

  number       = 9,

  volume       = 12,

  place        = {United States},

  year         = {2019},

  month        = {9}

}

Copy to clipboard

Journal Article:

Free Publicly Available Full Text

This content will become publicly available on September 11, 2020

Publisher's Version of Record

DOI: 10.5194/amt-12-4931-2019

Other availability

Search WorldCat to find libraries that may hold this journal

Save / Share:

Export Metadata

Save to My Library

Similar Records in DOE PAGES and OSTI.GOV collections:

Midlatitude Oceanic Cloud and Precipitation Properties as Sampled By the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Observatory

Journal Article Giangrande, Scott E. ; Wang, Die ; Bartholomew, Mary Jane ; ... - Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres

Marine low clouds are critical to the climate system because of their extensive coverage and associated controls on boundary layer dynamics and radiative energy balance. The primary foci are marine low cloud observations over a heavily instrumented site on the Azores archipelago in the eastern North Atlantic (ENA) and their associated raindrop size distribution (DSD) properties, relative low-cloud contributions to the precipitation, and additional sampling (instrument, environmental) considerations. The contribution from low clouds (e.g., cloud top < 4 km) to the overall precipitation over midlatitude oceans is poorly understood, in part because of the lack of coupled, high-quality measurements ofmore »« less
DOI: 10.1029/2018JD029667
Midlatitude Oceanic Cloud and Precipitation Properties as Sampled by the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Observatory

Journal Article Giangrande, Scott E. ; Wang, Die ; Bartholomew, Mary Jane ; ... - Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
DOI: 10.1029/2018JD029667
Midlatitude Oceanic Cloud Precipitation Properties as Sampled By the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Observatory

Journal Article Giangrande, Scott ; Wang, Die´ ; Bartholomew, Mary Jane ; ... - Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres

Marine low clouds are critical to the climate system because of their extensive coverage and associated controls on boundary layer dynamics and radiative energy balance. The primary foci for this study are marine low cloud observations over a heavily instrumented site on the Azores archipelago in the eastern North Atlantic (ENA) and their associated raindrop size distribution (DSD) properties, relative low-cloud contributions to the precipitation, and additional sampling (instrument, environmental) considerations. The contribution from low clouds (e.g., cloud top < 4 km) to the overall precipitation over midlatitude oceans is poorly understood, in part because of the lack of coupled,more »« less
DOI: 10.1029/2018JD029667
WRF Hindcasts of Cold Front Passages over the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Site: A Sensitivity Study

Journal Article Lamraoui, Fayçal ; Booth, James F. ; Naud, Catherine M. - Monthly Weather Review

The present study explores the ability of the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model to accurately reproduce the passage of extratropical cold fronts at the DOE ARM eastern North Atlantic (ENA) observation site on the Azores. An analysis of three case studies is performed in which the impact of the WRF domain size, position of the model boundary relative to the ENA site, grid spacing, and spectral nudging conditions are explored. The results from these case studies indicate that model biases in the timing and duration of cold front passages change with the distance between the model domain boundary andmore »« less
Cited by 1
DOI: 10.1175/mwr-d-17-0281.1

Full Text Available
The diurnal cycle of clouds and precipitation at the ARM SGP site: Cloud radar observations and simulations from the multiscale modeling framework

Journal Article Zhao, Wei ; Marchand, Roger ; Fu, Qiang - Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres

Millimeter Wavelength Cloud Radar (MMCR) data from December 1996 to December 2010, collected at the U.S. Department of Energy Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program Southern Great Plains (SGP) site, are used to examine the diurnal cycle of hydrometeor occurrence. These data are categorized into clouds (-40 dBZ _e ≤ reflectivity < -10 dBZ _e), drizzle and light precipitation (-10 dBZ _e ≤ reflectivity < 10 dBZ _e), and heavy precipitation (reflectivity ≥ 10 dBZ _e). The same criteria are implemented for the observation-equivalent reflectivity calculated by feeding outputs from a Multiscale Modeling Framework (MMF) climate model into a radar simulator.more »« less
Cited by 4
DOI: 10.1002/2016JD026353

Full Text Available

Similar Records