Barcelona atmospheric monitoring with lidar: first measurements with the UPC's scanning portable lidar

Results presented in this contribution correspond to the first measurements made with the transportable lidar system developed by the Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya, which were collected during the eyra 2000 in the city of Barcelona. The system uses a Nd:YAG laser at 1064 nm wavelength and 0.35 J pulse energy at a 20 Hz pulse repetition rate, has a 20 cm diameter telescope and a scanning range of 120 degrees in elevation and 300 degrees in azimuth. In this study only vertical profiles of atmospheric extinction will be shown. Data were acquired under several meteorological situations, showing the influence that this factor has in the arrangement of aerosols in the vertical dimension, and the distributions of backscatter extinction coefficients obtained from the lidar. Data have also been compared to radiosonde profiles acquired in Barcelona at a near time and have shown how the vertical arrangement of aerosols is correlated with changes in atmospheric stability condition, water content and wind direction.