Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming

We investigate the ways in which marine biologically mediated heating increases the surface atmospheric temperature. While the effects of phytoplankton light absorption on the ocean have gained attention over the past years, the impact of this biogeophysical mechanism on the atmosphere is still unclear. Phytoplankton light absorption warms the surface of the ocean, which in turn affects the air–sea heat and CO2 exchanges. However, the contribution of air–sea heat versus CO2 fluxes in the phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming has not been yet determined. Different so-called climate pathways are involved. We distinguish heat exchange, CO2 exchange, dissolved CO2, solubility of CO2 and sea-ice-covered area. To shed more light on this subject, we employ the EcoGEnIE Earth system model that includes a new light penetration scheme and isolate the effects of individual fluxes. Our results indicate that phytoplankton-induced changes in air–sea CO2 exchange warm the atmosphere by 0.71 ∘C due to higher greenhouse gas concentrations. The phytoplankton-induced changes in air–sea heat exchange cool the atmosphere by 0.02 ∘C due to a larger amount of outgoing longwave radiation. Overall, the enhanced air–sea CO2 exchange due to phytoplankton light absorption is the main driver in the biologically induced atmospheric heating.

On the energy budget of a low-Arctic snowpack

Arctic landscapes are covered in snow for at least 6 months of the year. The energy balance of the snow cover plays a key role in these environments, influencing the surface albedo, the thermal regime of the permafrost, and other factors. Our goal is to quantify all major heat fluxes above, within, and below a low-Arctic snowpack at a shrub tundra site on the east coast of Hudson Bay in eastern Canada. The study is based on observations from a flux tower that uses the eddy covariance approach and from profiles of temperature and thermal conductivity in the snow and soil. Additionally, we compared the observations with simulations produced using the Crocus snow model. We found that radiative losses due to negative longwave radiation are mostly counterbalanced by the sensible heat flux, whereas the latent heat flux is minimal. At the snow surface, the heat flux into the snow is similar in magnitude to the sensible heat flux. Because the snow cover stores very little heat, the majority of the upward heat flux in the snow is used to cool the soil. Overall, the model was able to reproduce the observed energy balance, but due to the effects of atmospheric stratification, it showed some deficiencies when simulating turbulent heat fluxes at an hourly timescale.

Some aspects of Indian northeast monsoon as derived from TOVS data

The Tiros Operational Vertical Sounder (TOVS) is a popular satellite sounding system. In this paper certain features of Indian northeast monsoon have been studied with the help of three years of TOVS data received through the satellite ground station located at the Regional Meteorological Centre, Chennai. The TOVS based latitudinal and longitudinal profiles of Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR) and Precipitable Water Vapour (PWV) were derived for various phases of northeast monsoon activity, over coastal and interior Tamilnadu and oceanic regions. These were consistent with the known spatial rainfall characteristics of northeast monsoon. The average vertical temperature profiles derived for the various phases of northeast monsoon for the different regions revealed that the lowest layer and upper troposphere are warmer and mid troposphere colder during active northeast monsoon compared to dry phase. The diurnal variation of OLR and PWV and the comparability of TOVS derived data with conventional upper air data and INSAT data have been briefly discussed.

Characteristics of radiative and non-radiative energy fluxes over monsoon trough zone

In order to describe behaviour of radiative and non-radiative erergy fluxes in the surface layer, computation of net radiation, sensible, latent and heat soil flux has been done using hourly global radiation, slow response data of MONTBLEX-90 and surface observation of Varanasi and Jodhpur during rainy and non-rainy days in July 1990. Daily and hourly ground temperature is calculated solving one dimensional heat conduction equation and soil heat flux is computed using force restored method .Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR) is calculated by Stefan-Boltzrnann law of radiation and the largest diurnal variability was found over dry convective zone. Results show that OLR from the ground lies in the range 473.0-537.6 Wm-2 at Jodhpur and 497.4 -548.4 Wm-2 at Varanasi during generally cloudy day. The dip in OLR is increascd by 10% with increase of relative humidity and cloudiness. Daily mean of the largest downward soil heat flux are found as 206.4 and 269.4 Wm-2 at Varanasi and Jodhpur respectively during cloudy day. About 40-50% of net radiation is imparted to soil heat flux at Varanasi and Jodhpur. Sum of the hourly non- radiative energy fluxes has not been balanced by net radiation while daily cumulative value of the fluxes balances the net radiation during non-rainy day.

Importance of radiative transfer processes in urban climate models: a study based on the PALM 6.0 model system

Including radiative transfer processes within the urban canopy layer into microscale urban climate models (UCMs) is essential to obtain realistic model results. These processes include the interaction of buildings and vegetation with shortwave and longwave radiation, thermal emission, and radiation reflections. They contribute differently to the radiation budget of urban surfaces. Each process requires different computational resources and physical data for the urban elements. This study investigates how much detail modellers should include to parameterize radiative transfer in microscale building-resolving UCMs. To that end, we introduce a stepwise parameterization method to the Parallelized Large-eddy Simulation Model (PALM) system 6.0 to quantify individually the effects of the main radiative transfer processes on the radiation budget and on the flow field. We quantify numerical simulations of both simple and realistic urban configurations to identify the major and the minor effects of radiative transfer processes on the radiation budget. The study shows that processes such as surface and vegetation interaction with shortwave and longwave radiation will have major effects, while a process such as multiple reflections will have minor effects. The study also shows that radiative transfer processes within the canopy layer implicitly affect the incoming radiation since the radiative transfer model is coupled to the radiation model. The flow field changes considerably in response to the radiative transfer processes included in the model. The study identified those processes which are essentially needed to assure acceptable quality of the flow field. These processes are receiving radiation from atmosphere based on the sky-view factors, interaction of urban vegetation with radiation, radiative transfer among urban surfaces, and considering at least single reflection of radiation. Omitting any of these processes may lead to high uncertainties in the model results.

Diurnal variation of outgoing longwave radiation derived from I NSA T-I B data

In this paper, 3-hourly values of Outgoing Long wave Radiation (OLR) for the years 1987 .to 1990 over the Indian Ocean region, derived from'1NSAT-IB VHRR observations, have been used to study the patterns of diurnal variation of OLR. The nature of the diurnal variations over different regions such as desert, ocean, monsoon area and equatorial trough in four representative months of the year is discussed. The variations in the diurnal range of OLR and the hours of occurrence of OLR minimum and maximum, are also presented.Daily means of TNSAT OLR using all.eight 3-hour samples and four different pairs of. 12-hour samples were computed. Results show that they are highly correlated. However, averages made with OLR values corresponding to 0230 and 1430 local time are slight underestimates compared to the 8-sample averages, whereas averages based upon 0830 and 2030 local time are slight overestimates.

Comparative study of construction of divergence of wind field based on OLR data obtained from – polar orbiting and geostationary satellites

An assessment of Outgoing longwave radiation data obtained from polar orbiting and geostationary satellites is made to see which one, is more convenient and useful for the construction of divergence of the wind field for regional models. The availability of OLR data from TIROS-N (polar orbiting) and GOES-IO (geostationary) satellites during 1979 made it possible to assess and explore a statistical relationship among the OLR data and divergence of the wind field at 850 and 2°9 hPa. constructed from the analysls of the Global Experiment data sets. This study reveals a very strong relationship between these fields in the region of deep convective activity and this relationship has also been found to be stronger for geostationary satellite than polar orbiting satellite. The use or this relationship especially over data-sparse tropical oceanic regions for NWP models is suggested.

On the use of outgoing longwave radiation data in incorporating divergent part of the wind in analysis

In the present study, kinematic divergence computed using ECMWF grid point data at 850 hPa is enhanced by using the relationship between OLR and divergence. This new enhanced divergence is used to compute the velocity potential and then, the divergence part of the wind is obtained from velocity potetial. To obtain the rotational part of wind, we computed the vorticity from wind data, and subsequently stream function and obtained and the rotational part of the wind from the stream function. The total wind is the combination of divergent part obtained from modified velocity potential (using OLR data) and rotational part from unmodified stream function. This total wind field is used as initial guess for univariate objective analysis by optimum interpolation scheme so that Initial Guess field contained the more realistic divergent part of the wind. Consequently, the analysed field also will contain the divergent part of the wind.

Regional climate changes due to double CO2 simulation by CCM3

An equilibrium experiment has been conducted with CCM3 climate model in which the amount of CO2 in the model atmosphere is doubled and the differences in resulting climate has been examined. The results show that there is an overall decrease in outgoing longwave radiation indicating the possible increase in cloudiness. The total rainfall may not change significantly but the temporal and spatial distributions over India are likely to change as observed in past long term trends.

A method of estimating longwave radiation Over the Indian seas based on surface synoptic observations

An attempt has been made to estimate longwave radiative flux from sea surface using semi empirical models with the help of routinely observed meteorological parameters during the monsoon season. The estimated values are then compared with observed values to find out an appropriate method to compute a longwave flux. The study shows that clouds play an important role in determining the longwave flux. It IS found that lack of detailed knowledge of clouds obtained from ground based observations is responsible for the errors in the estimation of longwave flux. The errors are reduced using a regression method based on Monsoon-77 data set. The method was then tested with Monex-79 data set which served as independent data set. The method thus developed considerably reduces the errors associated with the estimation of long wave flux.