Tropical Outgoing Longwave Radiation and Longwave Cloud Forcing Diurnal Cycles from CERES

AbstractThe diurnal cycle is a fundamental earth system variability driven by daily variations in solar insolation. Understanding diurnal variability is important for characterizing top-of-atmosphere and surface energy budgets. Climatological and seasonal first diurnal cycle harmonics of outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) and longwave cloud forcing (LWCF) are investigated using the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) synoptic 3-hourly data. A comparison with previous studies indicates generally similar results. However, the results indicate that the CERES OLR diurnal cycle amplitudes are 10%–20% larger in desert regions than previous analyses. This difference results from the temporal interpolation technique overestimating the daily maximum OLR. OLR diurnal cycle amplitudes in other tropical regions agree with previous work. Results show that the diurnal maximum and minimum OLR variability contributes equally to the total OLR variance over ocean; however, over land the diurnal maximum OLR ...

[1]  A. Genio,et al.  The Role of Entrainment in the Diurnal Cycle of Continental Convection , 2010 .

[2]  Patrick Minnis,et al.  Temporal Interpolation Methods for the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) Experiment , 1998 .

[3]  E. Zipser,et al.  The Diurnal Cycle of Rainfall and Convective Intensity according to Three Years of TRMM Measurements , 2003 .

[4]  Brian J. Soden,et al.  The diurnal cycle of convection, clouds, and water vapor in the tropical upper troposphere , 2000 .

[5]  Sunny Sun-Mack,et al.  CERES Edition-2 Cloud Property Retrievals Using TRMM VIRS and Terra and Aqua MODIS Data—Part I: Algorithms , 2011, IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing.

[6]  Murry L. Salby,et al.  Diurnal Variations of Cloud Cover and Their Relationship to Climatological Conditions , 1996 .

[7]  John M. Wallace,et al.  Satellite-Inferred Morning-to-Evening Cloudiness Changes , 1980 .

[8]  Harshvardhan,et al.  Diurnal Variability of the Hydrologic Cycle in a General Circulation Model , 1991 .

[9]  Johannes Schmetz,et al.  Diurnal variation of outgoing longwave radiation associated with high cloud and UTH changes from Meteosat-5 measurements , 2009 .

[10]  D. Corney,et al.  The Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget project , 2005 .

[11]  K. Lau,et al.  Diurnal Variations in Tropical Oceanic Cumulus Convection during TOGA COARE , 1997 .

[12]  D. Hartmann,et al.  Diurnal variations of outgoing longwave radiation and albedo from ERBE scanner data , 1991 .

[13]  D. Hartmann,et al.  Diurnal variation of outgoing longwave radiation in the tropics , 1986 .

[14]  Observations of diurnal and spatial variability of radiative forcing by equatorial deep convective clouds , 2004 .

[15]  H. Hendon,et al.  The diurnal cycle of tropical convection , 1993 .

[16]  J. Morcrette.  Evaluation of Model-generated Cloudiness: Satellite-observed and Model-generated Diurnal Variability of Brightness Temperature , 1991 .

[17]  P. Duynkerke,et al.  Comparison of the ECMWF Reanalysis with FIRE I Observations: Diurnal Variation of Marine Stratocumulus , 2001 .

[18]  G. Heygster,et al.  Effect of cirrus clouds on the diurnal cycle of tropical deep convective clouds , 2006 .

[19]  R. Allan,et al.  Evaluation of the Met Office global forecast model using Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget (GERB) data , 2007 .

[20]  Patrick Minnis,et al.  Diurnal variability of regional cloud and clear-sky radiative parameters derived from GOES data. Part II : November 1978 cloud distributions. , 1984 .

[21]  Quanhua Liu,et al.  Outgoing longwave radiation and its diurnal variation at regional scales derived from Meteosat , 1988 .

[22]  B. Soden,et al.  Diurnal cycle of convection, clouds, and water vapor in the tropical upper troposphere: Satellites versus a general circulation model , 2004 .

[23]  Patrick Minnis,et al.  Examination of the relationship between outgoing infrared window and total longwave fluxes using satellite data , 1991 .

[24]  Observations of the diurnal cycle of outgoing longwave radiation from the Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget instrument , 2007 .

[25]  W. M. Gray,et al.  Diurnal Variation of Deep Cumulus Convection , 1977 .

[26]  John E. Harries,et al.  Determining cloud forcing by cloud type from geostationary satellite data , 2005 .

[27]  E. Raschke,et al.  The Radiation Balance of the Planet Earth from Radiation Measurements of the Satellite Nimbus II. , 1970 .

[28]  E. Smith,et al.  Persistent Nature of Secondary Diurnal Modes of Precipitation over Oceanic and Continental Regimes , 2008 .

[29]  D. Randall,et al.  Diurnal Variability of the Hydrologic Cycle and Radiative Fluxes: Comparisons between Observations and a GCM , 2000 .

[30]  A. Gruber,et al.  Diurnal variation of outgoing longwave radiation , 1988 .

[31]  Patrick Minnis,et al.  Diurnal Variability of Regional Cloud and Clear-Sky Radiative Parameters Derived from GOES Data. Part III: November 1978 Radiative Parameters , 1984 .

[32]  J. Slingo,et al.  The Diurnal Cycle in the Tropics , 2001 .

[33]  S. Klein,et al.  An observational study of diurnal variations of marine stratiform cloud , 1995 .

[34]  David R. Doelling,et al.  Toward Optimal Closure of the Earth's Top-of-Atmosphere Radiation Budget , 2009 .

[35]  Patrick Minnis,et al.  Diurnal Variability of Regional Cloud and Clear-Sky Radiative Parameters Derived from GOES Data. Part I: Analysis Method , 1984 .

[36]  G. Louis Smith,et al.  The diurnal cycle of outgoing longwave radiation from Earth Radiation Budget Experiment measurements , 2003 .

[37]  R. Garreaud,et al.  The Diurnal Cycle in Circulation and Cloudiness over the Subtropical Southeast Pacific: A Modeling Study , 2004 .

[38]  Murry L. Salby,et al.  The Role of Cloud Diurnal Variations in the Time-Mean Energy Budget , 1997 .

[39]  J. Janowiak,et al.  An Examination of the Diurnal Cycle in Oceanic Tropical Rainfall Using Satellite and In Situ Data , 1994 .

[40]  A. Slingo,et al.  Simulation of the diurnal cycle in a climate model and its evaluation using data from Meteosat 7 , 2004 .

[41]  S. Nicholls,et al.  A Study of the Diurnal Variation of Stratocumulus Using A Multiple Mixed Layer Model , 2007 .

[42]  S. Schubert,et al.  Seasonality and Meridional Propagation of the MJO , 2006 .