The spatial extent of rainfall events and its relation to precipitation scaling

Journal article (2017)

Authors

K.U. Lochbihler Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI), Atmospheric Remote Sensing - CEG
G. Lenderink Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI)
A.P. Siebesma Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI), Atmospheric Physics
Research Group
Atmospheric Remote Sensing (CEG) (TU Delft)
Copyright: © 2017 K.U. Lochbihler, G. Lenderink, A.P. Siebesma
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL074857
More Info
expand_more

Published Date

28-08-2017

Language

English

Reuse Rights

Other than for strictly personal use, it is not permitted to download, forward or distribute the text or part of it, without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), unless the work is under an open content license such as Creative Commons.

Faculty

Civil Engineering & Geosciences

Department

Geoscience and Remote Sensing

Research Group

Atmospheric Remote Sensing

Abstract

Observations show that subdaily precipitation extremes increase with dew point temperature at a rate exceeding the Clausius-Clapeyron (CC) relation. The understanding of this so-called super CC scaling is still incomplete, and observations of convective cell properties could provide important information. Here the size and intensity of rain cells are investigated by using a tracking of rainfall events in high-resolution radar data. Higher intensities are accompanied by larger rainfall areas. However, whereas small rain cells mainly follow CC scaling, larger cells display super CC behavior. Even more, for dew point exceeding 15°C, the rain cell size has to increase in order to sustain super CC scaling and a remarked increase in rain cell area is found. Our results imply that the source area of moisture, the cloud size, and the degree of mesoscale organization play key roles in the context of a warming climate.

Files

Lochbihler_et_al_2017_Geophysi... (pdf)
(pdf | 0.907 Mb)
- Embargo expired in 20-02-2018
Unknown license