Indian Journal of Science and Technology

Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access

A Study of Atmospheric Boundary Layer (ABL) Height Estimation using Various Analytical Methods -COSMIC RO Measured Temperature Profiles


Affiliations
1 Department of Basic Science, Gudlavalleru Engineering College, Gudlavalleru - 521356, Andhra Pradesh, India
2 Departmentof Basic Science, Shri Vishnu Engineering College for Women, Bhimavaram - 534202, Andhra Pradesh, India
3 Departmentof Physics, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam - 530003, Andhra Pradesh, India
4 School of Renewable Energy and Environment, JNTUK, Kakinada - 533003, Andhra Pradesh, India
5 Department of ECE, Shri Vishnu Engineering College for Women, Bhimavaram - 534202, Andhra Pradesh, India
 

Objectives: Although several methods are available to identify ABLHeight (ABLH), a comprehensive study on the usage of different analytical methods has not been reported widely, particularly on global databases. Methods/Analysis: In this research, we use various analytical methods including, gradient, double gradient and logarithmic gradient to estimate ABLH during two months (March and April 2013) period and applied those methods on COSMIC Radio Occultation retrieved temperature profiles to estimate ABLH. Findings: The estimated ABLHs are arranged in order to present them globally and diurnally that clearly show a few distinct features. Mainly, land and desert areas are associated with higher ABLH during daytime hours. Cold land areas (Arctic and Greenland) show relatively lower magnitudes and reverse are the cases with ABLH over cold oceans (Antarctic oceans). Most importantly, a distinctive diurnal feature is observed with a peak at sharp noon time and relatively lower values in the night time, which indicate both convective and stable layers, have evolved based on the ambient conditions that would exist during the day and nighttime ambient conditions. However, morning and evening transitions are not found in diurnal variations. Applications/Improvements: It is found that both gradient and logarithmic methods are able to find accurate ABLH, though still a great room exists to verify various other methods in finding ABLH.
User

  • Stull RB. An introduction to boundary layer meteorology. Dordrecht, Boston and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers; 1988. p. 1–666. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-3027-8

  • Garratt JR. The atmospheric boundary layer. Cambridge, U.K: Cambridge University Press; 1992; 14(2):112–3. PMCid: PMC1882468.

  • Seibert P, Beyrich F, Gryning SE, Joffre S, Rasmussen A, Tercier P. Review and intercomparison of operational methods for the determination of the mixing height. Atmospheric Environment. 2000; 34(7):1001–27. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1352-2310(99)00349-0

  • Stevens B. Cloud-transitions and decoupling in shearfree stratocumulus-topped boundary layers. Geophysical Research Letters. 2002; 27(16):2557–60. https://doi.org/10.1029/1999GL011257

  • Lin, JT, Youn D, Liang XZ, Wuebbles DJ. Global model simulation of summertime U.S. ozone diurnal cycle and its sensitivity to PBL mixing, spatial resolution and emissions. Atmos Environ. 2008; 42:8470–83. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2008.08.012

  • Pearson G, Davies F, Collier C. Remote sensing of the tropical rainforest boundary layer using pulsed Dopplerlidar. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. 2010; 10:5891–901. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-10-5891-2010

  • Saha A, Mallet M, Roger JC, Dubuisson P, Piazzola J, Despiau S. One year measurements of aerosol optical properties over an urban coastal site: Effect on local direct radiative forcing. Atmospheric Research. 2008; 90(24):195–202. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2008.02.003

  • Ouwersloot HG, Vila-Gueraude Arellano J, Nolscher AC, Krol MC, Ganzeveld LN, Breitenberger C, Mammarella I, Williams J, Lelieveld J. Characterization of a boreal Convective Boundary Layer and its impact on atmospheric chemistry during HUMPPA-COPEC-2010. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. 2012; 12:9335–53. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-12-9335-2012

  • Garratt JR. Review: The atmospheric boundary layer. Earth-Science Reviews.1994; 37(1-2):89–134. https://doi.org/10.1016/0012-8252(94)90026-4

  • Seidel DJ, Ao CO, Li K. Estimating climatological planetary boundary layer heights from radiosonde observations: Comparison of methods and uncertainty analysis. Journal of Geophysical Research. 2010; 115(D16):113–3. https:// doi.org/10.1029/2009JD013680

  • Liu S, Liang X. Observed diurnal cycle climatology of planetary boundary layer height. Journal of Climate. 2010; 23(21):5790–809. https://doi.org/10.1175/2010JCLI3552.1

  • Prijith SS, Rao PVN, Sujatha P, Dadhwal VK. Estimation of planetary boundary layer height using Suomi NPP-Cris soundings. Remote Sensing Letters. 2016; 7(7):621–30. https://doi.org/10.1080/2150704X.2016.1171921

  • Angevine WM, White AB, Avery SK. Boundary-layer depth and entrainment zone characterization with a boundarylayer profiler. Boundary Layer Meteor.1994; 68(4):375–85. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00706797

  • Molod A, Salmun H, Dempsey M. Estimating planetary boundary layer heights from NOAA profiler network wind profiler data. Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology. 2015; 32:1545–61. https://doi.org/10.1175/ JTECH-D-14-00155.1

  • Davis KJ, Gamage N, Hagelberg CR, Kiemble C, Lenschow DH, Sullivan PP. An objective method for deriving atmospheric structure from airborne lidar observations. Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology. 2000; 17:1455–68. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0426(2000)017<1455:AOMF DA>2.0.CO;2

  • Kumar YB. Portable lidar system for Atmospheric Boundary Layer measurements. Optical Engineering. 2006; 45(7):076201–5. https://doi.org/10.1117/1.2221555

  • Guo P, Kuo YH, Sokolovskiy SV, Lenschow DH. Estimating Atmospheric Boundary Layer depth using cosmic radio occulation data. Journal of Atmospheric Science. 2011; 68:1703–13. https://doi.org/10.1175/2011JAS3612.1

  • Ao CO, Mannucci, AJ, Kursinski ER. Improving GPS Radio Occultation stratospheric refractivity retrievals for climate benchmarking. Geophysical Research Letters. 2012; 39(12):1–18. https://doi.org/10.1029/2012GL051720

  • Ho SP, Peng L, Anthes RA, Kuo YH, Lin HC. Marine boundary layer heights and their longitudinal diurnal and interannual variation in the southeast Pacific using COSMIC CALIOP and radiosonde data. Journal of Climate. 2015; 28(7):2856–72. https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00238.1

  • Von Engeln A, Teixeira J.A Planetary boundary layer height climatology derived from ECMWF reanalysis data. Journal of Climate. 2013; 26(17):6575–90. https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00385.1

  • Liu J, Huang J, Chen B, Zhou T, Yan H, Jin H, Huang Z, Zhang B. Comparisons of PBL heights derived from CALIPSO and ECMWF reanalysis data over China. Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer. 2015; 153:102–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jqsrt.2014.10.011

  • Garfinkel CI, Waugh DW, Polvani LM. Recent Hadley cell expansion: The role of internal atmospheric variability in reconciling modeled and observed trends. Geophysical Research Letter. 2015; 42(24):10824–31. https://doi.org/10.1002/2015GL066942

  • Babu N. Anomalous wind circulation over Taipei, Taiwan during the northern winter seasons of 2004 and 2005 - A case study. Satellite Oceanography and Meteorology. 2018; 3(2):01–11.

  • Mastaan R, Brahmanandam PS, Uma G, Babu AN, Reddy KK. Studies of two important stability indices of Earth’s atmosphere determined by using the COSMIC GPS Radio Occultation technique. Indian Journal of Science and Technology. 2016; 9(38):1–9. https://doi.org/10.17485/ijst/2016/v9i38/98595

  • Brahmanandam PS, Chu YH, Liu J. Observations of equatorial Kelvin wave modes in FORMOSAT- 3/COSMIC GPS RO temperature profiles. Terrestrial Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. 2010; 21(5):829–40. https://doi.org/10.3319/TAO.2010.01.06.01(A)

  • Ao CO, Hajj GA, Meehan TK, Dong D, Iijima BA, Mannucci AJ, Kursinski ER. Rising and setting GPS occultations by use of open-loop tracking. Journal of Geophysical Research. 2009; 21(5):829–40.

  • Barbara H, Andrea L. Determination of the Atmospheric Boundary Layer height from radiosonde and lidar backscatter. Boundary-Layer Meteorology. 2006; 120(1):181–200. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-005-9035-3

  • Shukla KK, Phanikumar DV, Newsom RK, Kumar KN, Ratnam MV, Naja M, Singh N. Estimation of the mixing layer height over a high altitude site in Central Himalayan region by using Doppler lidar. Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics. 2014; 109:48–53. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jastp.2014.01.006

  • Yang T, Wang Z, Zhang W, Gbaguidi A, Sugimoto N, Wang Z, Matsui I, Sun Y. Technical note: Boundary layer height determination from lidar for improving air pollution episode modeling: Development of new algorithm and evaluation. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. 2017; 17:6215–25. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-6215-2017

  • Senff C, Bosenberg J, Peters G, Schaberl T. Remote sensing of turbulent ozone fluxes and the ozone budget in the Convective Boundary Layer with DIAL and radar-RASS: A case study. Contributions to Atmospheric Physics. 1996; 69(1):161–76.

  • Cheng CZF, Kuo YH, Anthes RA, Wu L. Satellite constellation monitors global and space weather. Eos Transactions American Geophysical Union. 2006; 87(17):166. https://doi.org/10.1029/2006EO170003

  • Angevine WM, Klein Baltink H, Bosveld FC. Observations of the morning transition of the convective boundary layer. Boundary-Layer Meteorology. 2001; 101(2):209–27. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1019264716195

  • Sudarsan JS, Thattai D, Shah UK, Mitra A. Micrometeorological tower observations and their importance in atmospheric modeling and space technology. Indian Journal of Science and Technology. 2016 Nov; 9(42):1–6. https://doi.org/10.17485/ijst/2016/v9i42/104594


Abstract Views: 221

PDF Views: 0




  • A Study of Atmospheric Boundary Layer (ABL) Height Estimation using Various Analytical Methods -COSMIC RO Measured Temperature Profiles

Abstract Views: 221  |  PDF Views: 0

Authors

V. Naveen Kumar
Department of Basic Science, Gudlavalleru Engineering College, Gudlavalleru - 521356, Andhra Pradesh, India
P. S. Brahmanandam
Departmentof Basic Science, Shri Vishnu Engineering College for Women, Bhimavaram - 534202, Andhra Pradesh, India
M. Purnachandra Rao
Departmentof Physics, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam - 530003, Andhra Pradesh, India
G. Anil Kumar
School of Renewable Energy and Environment, JNTUK, Kakinada - 533003, Andhra Pradesh, India
K. Samatha
Departmentof Physics, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam - 530003, Andhra Pradesh, India
L. Rupa Dhanasri
Department of ECE, Shri Vishnu Engineering College for Women, Bhimavaram - 534202, Andhra Pradesh, India

Abstract


Objectives: Although several methods are available to identify ABLHeight (ABLH), a comprehensive study on the usage of different analytical methods has not been reported widely, particularly on global databases. Methods/Analysis: In this research, we use various analytical methods including, gradient, double gradient and logarithmic gradient to estimate ABLH during two months (March and April 2013) period and applied those methods on COSMIC Radio Occultation retrieved temperature profiles to estimate ABLH. Findings: The estimated ABLHs are arranged in order to present them globally and diurnally that clearly show a few distinct features. Mainly, land and desert areas are associated with higher ABLH during daytime hours. Cold land areas (Arctic and Greenland) show relatively lower magnitudes and reverse are the cases with ABLH over cold oceans (Antarctic oceans). Most importantly, a distinctive diurnal feature is observed with a peak at sharp noon time and relatively lower values in the night time, which indicate both convective and stable layers, have evolved based on the ambient conditions that would exist during the day and nighttime ambient conditions. However, morning and evening transitions are not found in diurnal variations. Applications/Improvements: It is found that both gradient and logarithmic methods are able to find accurate ABLH, though still a great room exists to verify various other methods in finding ABLH.

References





DOI: https://doi.org/10.17485/ijst%2F2018%2Fv11i31%2F131008