Identification

Title

Aerosol impacts on thermally driven orographic convection

Abstract

Observations from the Dominica Experiment (DOMEX) field campaign clearly show aerosols having an impact on cloud microphysical properties in thermally driven orographic clouds. It is hypothesized that when convection is forced by island surface heating, aerosols from the mostly forested island surface are lofted into the clouds, resulting in the observed high concentration of aerosols and the high concentration of small cloud droplets. When trying to understand the impact of these surface-based aerosols on precipitation, however, observed differences in cloud-layer moisture add to the complexity. The WRF Model with the aerosol-aware Thompson microphysics scheme is used to study six idealized scenarios of thermally driven island convection: with and without a surface aerosol source, with a relatively dry cloud layer and with a moist cloud layer, and with no wind and with a weak background wind. It is found that at least a weak background wind is needed to ensure Dominica-relevant results and that the effect of cloud-layer moisture on cloud and precipitation formation dominates over the effect of aerosol. The aerosol impact is limited by the dominance of precipitation formation through accretion. Nevertheless, in order to match observed cloud microphysical properties and precipitation, both a relatively dry cloud layer and a surface aerosol source are needed. The impact of a surface aerosol source on precipitation is strongest when the environment is not conducive to cloud growth.

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document

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http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7sj1n92

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eng

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geoscientificInformation

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publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

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publication

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2016-08-01T00:00:00Z

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Copyright 2016 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be "fair use" under Section 107 or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law (17 USC, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the Society's permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form on servers, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statements, requires written permission or license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policies, available from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or amspubs@ametsoc.org. Permission to place a copy of this work on this server has been provided by the AMS. The AMS does not guarantee that the copy provided here is an accurate copy of the published work.

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OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

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opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

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