A double-Gerdien instrument for simultaneous bipolar air conductivity measurements on balloon platforms

A bipolar air conductivity instrument is described for use with a standard disposable meteorological radiosonde package. It is intended to provide electrical measurements at cloud boundaries, where the ratio of the bipolar air conductivities is affected by the presence of charged particles. The sensors are two identical Gerdien-type electrodes, which, through a voltage decay method, measure positive and negative air conductivities simultaneously. Voltage decay provides a thermally stable approach and a novel low current leakage electrometer switch is described which initiates the decay sequence. The radiosonde supplies power and telemetry, as well as measuring simultaneous meteorological data. A test flight using a tethered balloon determined positive (σ+) and negative (σ−) conductivities of σ+ = 2.77±0.2 fS m−1 and σ− = 2.82±0.2 fS m−1, respectively, at 400 m aloft, with σ+/σ− = 0.98±0.04.

Introduction. Stochastic physics and climate modelling

Finite computing resources limit the spatial resolution of state-of-the-art global climate simulations to hundreds of kilometres. In neither the atmosphere nor the ocean are small-scale processes such as convection, clouds and ocean eddies properly represented. Climate simulations are known to depend, sometimes quite strongly, on the resulting bulk-formula representation of unresolved processes. Stochastic physics schemes within weather and climate models have the potential to represent the dynamical effects of unresolved scales in ways which conventional bulk-formula representations are incapable of so doing. The application of stochastic physics to climate modelling is a rapidly advancing, important and innovative topic. The latest research findings are gathered together in the Theme Issue for which this paper serves as the introduction.

Quantifying the effects of perturbing the physics of an interactive sulfur scheme using an ensemble of GCMs on the climateprediction.net platform

Aerosols from anthropogenic and natural sources have been recognized as having an important impact on the climate system. However, the small size of aerosol particles (ranging from 0.01 to more than 10 μm in diameter) and their influence on solar and terrestrial radiation makes them difficult to represent within the coarse resolution of general circulation models (GCMs) such that small-scale processes, for example, sulfate formation and conversion, need parameterizing. It is the parameterization of emissions, conversion, and deposition and the radiative effects of aerosol particles that causes uncertainty in their representation within GCMs. The aim of this study was to perturb aspects of a sulfur cycle scheme used within a GCM to represent the climatological impacts of sulfate aerosol derived from natural and anthropogenic sulfur sources. It was found that perturbing volcanic SO2 emissions and the scavenging rate of SO2 by precipitation had the largest influence on the sulfate burden. When these parameters were perturbed the sulfate burden ranged from 0.73 to 1.17 TgS for 2050 sulfur emissions (A2 Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES)), comparable with the range in sulfate burden across all the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change SRESs. Thus, the results here suggest that the range in sulfate burden due to model uncertainty is comparable with scenario uncertainty. Despite the large range in sulfate burden there was little influence on the climate sensitivity, which had a range of less than 0.5 K across the ensemble. We hypothesize that this small effect was partly associated with high sulfate loadings in the control phase of the experiment.

Cloud-radar observations of insects in the UK convective boundary layer

Radar has been applied to the study of insect migration for almost 40 years, but most entomological radars operate at X-band (9.4 GHz, 3.2 cm wavelength), and can only detect individuals of relatively large species, such as migratory grasshoppers and noctuid moths, over all of their flight altitudes. Many insects (including economically important species) are much smaller than this, but development of the requisite higher power and/or higher frequency radar systems to detect these species is often prohibitively expensive. In this paper, attention is focussed upon the uses of some recently-deployed meteorological sensing devices to investigate insect migratory flight behaviour, and especially its interactions with boundary layer processes. Records were examined from the vertically-pointing 35 GHz ‘Copernicus’ and 94 GHz ‘Galileo’ cloud radars at Chilbolton (Hampshire, England) for 12 cloudless and convective occasions in summer 2003, and one of these occasions (13 July) is presented in detail. Insects were frequently found at heights above aerosol particles, which represent passive tracers, indicating active insect movement. It was found that insect flight above the convective boundary layer occurs most often during the morning. The maximum radar reflectivity (an indicator of aerial insect biomass) was found to be positively correlated with maximum screen temperature.

A review of the theoretical basis for bulk mass flux convective parameterization

Most parameterizations for precipitating convection in use today are bulk schemes, in which an ensemble of cumulus elements with different properties is modelled as a single, representative entraining-detraining plume. We review the underpinning mathematical model for such parameterizations, in particular by comparing it with spectral models in which elements are not combined into the representative plume. The chief merit of a bulk model is that the representative plume can be described by an equation set with the same structure as that which describes each element in a spectral model. The equivalence relies on an ansatz for detrained condensate introduced by Yanai et al. (1973) and on a simplified microphysics. There are also conceptual differences in the closure of bulk and spectral parameterizations. In particular, we show that the convective quasi-equilibrium closure of Arakawa and Schubert (1974) for spectral parameterizations cannot be carried over to a bulk parameterization in a straightforward way. Quasi-equilibrium of the cloud work function assumes a timescale separation between a slow forcing process and a rapid convective response. But, for the natural bulk analogue to the cloud-work function (the dilute CAPE), the relevant forcing is characterised by a different timescale, and so its quasi-equilibrium entails a different physical constraint. Closures of bulk parameterization that use the non-entraining parcel value of CAPE do not suffer from this timescale issue. However, the Yanai et al. (1973) ansatz must be invoked as a necessary ingredient of those closures.

Estimating surface CO2 fluxes from space-borne dry air mole fraction observations using an Ensemble Kalman filter

We have developed an ensemble Kalman Filter (EnKF) to estimate 8-day regional surface fluxes of CO2 from space-borne CO2 dry-air mole fraction observations (XCO2) and evaluate the approach using a series of synthetic experiments, in preparation for data from the NASA Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO). The 32-day duty cycle of OCO alternates every 16 days between nadir and glint measurements of backscattered solar radiation at short-wave infrared wavelengths. The EnKF uses an ensemble of states to represent the error covariances to estimate 8-day CO2 surface fluxes over 144 geographical regions. We use a 12×8-day lag window, recognising that XCO2 measurements include surface flux information from prior time windows. The observation operator that relates surface CO2 fluxes to atmospheric distributions of XCO2 includes: a) the GEOS-Chem transport model that relates surface fluxes to global 3-D distributions of CO2 concentrations, which are sampled at the time and location of OCO measurements that are cloud-free and have aerosol optical depths <0.3; and b) scene-dependent averaging kernels that relate the CO2 profiles to XCO2, accounting for differences between nadir and glint measurements, and the associated scene-dependent observation errors. We show that OCO XCO2 measurements significantly reduce the uncertainties of surface CO2 flux estimates. Glint measurements are generally better at constraining ocean CO2 flux estimates. Nadir XCO2 measurements over the terrestrial tropics are sparse throughout the year because of either clouds or smoke. Glint measurements provide the most effective constraint for estimating tropical terrestrial CO2 fluxes by accurately sampling fresh continental outflow over neighbouring oceans. We also present results from sensitivity experiments that investigate how flux estimates change with 1) bias and unbiased errors, 2) alternative duty cycles, 3) measurement density and correlations, 4) the spatial resolution of estimated flux estimates, and 5) reducing the length of the lag window and the size of the ensemble. At the revision stage of this manuscript, the OCO instrument failed to reach its orbit after it was launched on 24 February 2009. The EnKF formulation presented here is also applicable to GOSAT measurements of CO2 and CH4.

Comparison of stochastic parameterisation approaches in a single-column model

We discuss and test the potential usefulness of single-column models (SCMs) for the testing of stochastic physics schemes that have been proposed for use in general circulation models (GCMs). We argue that although single column tests cannot be definitive in exposing the full behaviour of a stochastic method in the full GCM, and although there are differences between SCM testing of deterministic and stochastic methods, SCM testing remains a useful tool. It is necessary to consider an ensemble of SCM runs produced by the stochastic method. These can be usefully compared to deterministic ensembles describing initial condition uncertainty and also to combinations of these (with structural model changes) into poor man's ensembles. The proposed methodology is demonstrated using an SCM experiment recently developed by the GCSS (GEWEX Cloud System Study) community, simulating transitions between active and suppressed periods of tropical convection.

Inconsistencies between satellite estimates of longwave cloud forcing and dynamical fields from reanalyses

The greenhouse effect of cloud may be quantified as the difference between outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) and its clear-sky component (OLRc). Clear-sky measurements from satellite preferentially sample drier, more stable conditions relative to the monthly-mean state. The resulting observational bias is evident when OLRc is stratified by vertical motion; differences to climate model OLRc of 15 Wm−2 occur over warm regions of strong ascent. Using data from the ECMWF 40-year reanalysis, an estimate of cloud longwave radiative effect is made which is directly comparable with standard climate model diagnostics. The impact of this methodology on the cancellation of cloud longwave and shortwave radiative forcing in the tropics is estimated.

Vertical current flow through extensive layer clouds

The global atmospheric electrical circuit sustains a vertical current density between the ionosphere and the Earth's surface, the existence of which is well-established from measurements made in fair-weather conditions. In overcast, but non-thunderstorm, non-precipitating conditions, the current travels through the cloud present, despite cloud layers having low electrical conductivity. For extensive layer clouds, this leads to space charge at the upper and lower cloud boundaries. Using a combination of atmospheric electricity and solar radiation measurements at three UK sites, vertical current measurements have been categorised into clear, broken, and overcast cloud conditions. This approach shows that the vertical “fair weather” current is maintained despite the presence of cloud. In fully overcast conditions with thick cloud, the vertical current is reduced compared to thin cloud overcast conditions, associated with the cloud's resistance contributions. Contribution of cloud to the columnar resistance depends both on cloud thickness, and the cloud's height.

A lightweight balloon-carried cloud charge sensor

Despite the importance of microphysical cloud processes on the climate system, some topics are under-explored. For example, few measurements of droplet charges in nonthunderstorm clouds exist. Balloon carried charge sensors can be used to provide new measurements. A charge sensor is described for use with meteorological balloons, which has been tested over a range of atmospheric temperatures from -60 to 20 degrees C, in cloudy and clear air. The rapid time response of the sensor (to >10 V s(-1)) permits charge densities from 100 fC m(-3) to 1 nC m(-3) to be determined, which is sufficient for it to act as a cloud edge charge detector at weakly charged horizontal cloud boundaries.

Observed atmospheric electricity effect on clouds

The atmosphere's fair weather electric field is a permanent feature, arising from the combination of distant thunderstorms, Earth's conducting surface, a charged ionosphere and cosmic ray ionization. Despite its ubiquity, no fair weather electricity effect on clouds has been hitherto demonstrated. Here we report surface measurements of radiation emitted and scattered by extensive thin continental cloud, which, after ~2 min delay, shows changes closely following the fair weather electric field. For typical fluctuations in the fair weather electric field, changes of about 10% are subsequently induced in the diffuse short-wave radiation. These observations are consistent with enhanced production of large cloud droplets from charging at layer cloud edges.

Evidence for global circuit current flow through water droplet layers

Abstract Foggy air and clear air have appreciably different electrical conductivities. The conductivity gradient at horizontal droplet boundaries causes droplet charging, as a result of vertical current flow in the global atmospheric electrical circuit. The charging is poorly known, as both the current flow through atmospheric water droplet layers and the air conductivity are poorly characterised experimentally. Surface measurements during three days of continuous fog using new instrument techniques show that a shallow (of order 100 m deep) fog layer still permits the vertical conduction current to pass. Further, the conductivity in the fog is estimated to be approximately 20% lower than in clear air. Assuming a fog transition thickness of one metre, this implies a vertical conductivity gradient of order 10 fS m−2 at the boundary. The actual vertical conductivity gradient at a cloud boundary would probably be greater, due to the presence of larger droplets in clouds compared to fog, and cleaner, more conductive clear air aloft.