Canyon drainage induced mixing over a large basin
- and others
Complex terrain surrounding urbanized basins around the world has long been recognized to strongly affect the characteristics of vertical transport and mixing of pollutants. The Department of Energy's Vertical Transport and Mixing (VTMX) program will investigate mixing processes within night-time boundary layers over large urban basins. The program will launch several field experiments within the Salt Lake City basin in the coming years. This modeling study, like many other studies being undertaken by the participants of the VTMX programs, is intended to complement the proposed field experiments by numerically examining some of the flow interactions known to occur in large basins. Using idealized simulations, we particularly investigate drainage flows from deep canyons similar to those along the Wasatch Front into the Salt Lake City basin. Literature shows that under favorable conditions, drainage flows can generate bore waves that may propagate ahead of the density current (e.g., Simpson 1969; Simpson 1982; Crook and Miller 1985). Existence and frequency of such bore waves can profoundly influence the spatial and temporal variability of vertical transport and mixing within large basins. If bore waves do occur on a regular basis within the Salt Lake City basin (a task for the upcoming experiments to determine), then understanding the basin-scale conditions under which these waves are produced and how they may propagate and interact with the city's buildings will be of great importance in characterizing transport and mixing processes within the basin.
- Research Organization:
- Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- US Department of Energy (US)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-36
- OSTI ID:
- 769000
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR-00-2410; TRN: AH200105%%18
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: Conference title not provided, Conference location not provided, Conference dates not provided; Other Information: PBD: 1 May 2000
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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