Initial Evaluation of Profiles of Temperature, Water Vapor, and Cloud Liquid Water from a New Microwave Profiling Radiometer.

Liljegren, J. C. ; Lesht, B. M. ; Kato, S. ; Clothiaux, E. E.

Technical Information Center Oak Ridge Tennessee

关键词: Radiometers;    Water vapor;    Profiles;    Models;    Evaluation;   

RP-ID  :  DE2001768575

学科分类：工程和技术（综合）

美国|英语

来源: National Technical Reports Library

【 摘 要 】

To measure the vertical profiles of temperature and water vapor that are essential for modeling atmospheric processes, the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program of the U. S. Department of Energy launches approximately 2600 radiosondes each year from its Southern Great Plains (SGP) facilities in Oklahoma and Kansas, USA. The annual cost of this effort exceeds $500,000 in materials and labor. Despite the expense, these soundings have a coarse temporal resolution and reporting interval compared with model time steps. In contrast, the radiation measurements used for model evaluations have temporal resolutions and reporting intervals of a few minutes at most. Conversely, radiosondes have a much higher vertical spatial resolution than most models can use. Modelers generally reduce the vertical resolution of the soundings by averaging over the vertical layers of the model.