Meteorology, Missions, and Many Thoughts: Perspectives from a New Generation Earth Scientist

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Meteorology, Missions, and Many Thoughts
Perspectives from a New Generation Earth
Scientist Dr. Marshall Shepherd Office of Earth
Sciences, NASA Headquarters and Goddard Space
Flight Center
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The Radar Topography Mission The most
accurate global topography ever
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Important Systems For Life
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Studying Earth as a Complex System
Surface Winds Precipitation Reflection and
Transmission Evaporation Transpiration Surface
Temperature
Land
Atmosphere
Circulation Surface Winds Precipitation Reflection
and Transmission Surface Temperature Evaporation
Currents Upwelling
Infiltration Runoff Nutrient Loading Surface
Temperature Currents
Ocean
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Over Shorter Time Periods, However
Seasonal Biosphere from SeaWiFS
1997-99 El Nino / La Nina
2002 Western Fires
climate has exhibited considerable natural
variability
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Recently the Impacts of Human Activity Have
Become More Apparent

• Of the total forcing on the climate system, 40
  is due to the effect of greenhouse gases and
  aerosols, and 60 is from feedback effects such
  as increasing concentrations of water vapor as
  temperatures rise.
• Nearly 50 of the Worlds Land Surface has been
  transformed by human action
• Only 1 of Freshwater Available for human use
• Human activities are encroaching on coastal
  ecosystems

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Research Focus Areas
Predict
Whole Earth Modeling Capability
Weather
Understand
With real-time model -measurement feedback and
optimization
Climate
Atmos. Comp.
Water/Energy Cycle
Carbon Cycle/Ecosystems
Earth Surface/Interior/
Characterize
1990
2010
2025
2000
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Providing Global Measurements
Jason-1
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Meteorology..
Accurate global precipitation measurement is
required for better prediction of freshwater
resources, climate change , weather, and the
water cycle because precipitation is a key
process that links them all.
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• 80 of the U.S. population lives in urban areas

• Current urban growth rate in the U.S. is
  approximately 12.5

• The U.S. population is not only growing, but is
  tending to concentrate more and more in coastal
  zones

Source UN Population Fund
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The Urban Heat Island
Surface heat budget equation QSW QLW QSH
QLE QG QA 0
For the UHI, the difference in surface properties
of urban and rural areas leads to the differences
in thermal fluxes.
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Literature Documenting UHI Induced Rainfall
Anomalies

• Early investigations (Changnon 1968 Landsberg
  1970 Huff and Changnon 1972a and 1972b) found
  evidence of warm seasonal rainfall increases of 9
  to 17 over and downwind of urban cities.
• The Metropolitan Meteorological Experiment
  (METROMEX) was 1970s- (Changnon et al. 1977 Huff
  1986) urban effects lead to increased
  precipitation during the summer months.
  Increased precipitation was typically observed
  within and 50-75 km downwind of the city
  reflecting increases of 5-25 over background
  values (Huff and Vogel 1978 Changnon 1979
  Changnon et al. 1981 Changnon et al. 1991).
  METROMEX results also suggested that areal extent
  and magnitude of urban and downwind precipitation
  anomalies were related to size of the urban area
  (Changnon 1992).
• More recent studies have continued to validate
  and extend the findings from pre-METROMEX and
  post-METROMEX investigations to cities like
  Phoenix (Balling and Brazel 1987 Selover 1997),
  New York (Bornstein and Leroy 1990), Mexico City
  (Jauregui and Romales 1996), and Atlanta
  (Bornstein and Lin 2000).
• Thielen et al. (2000) used a meso-gamma scale
  model to show that sensible heat fluxes and
  enhanced roughness due to the urban heat island
  can have considerable influence on convective
  rainfall.
• Recently, Shepherd et al. (2002) and Shepherd and
  Burian (2003), possibly for the first time,
  utilized rainfall measurements from a spacecraft
  (NASAs Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission
  (TRMM)) to identify and quantify rainfall
  anomalies downwind of 6 major U.S. cities. That
  study established the feasibility of
  investigating urban-induced rainfall anomalies at
  multiple cities over a continuous period.

Bornstein and Lin, 2000
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• Houston covers an area of 937 km2 and is the
  fourth largest city in the U.S. with a population
  of 1.6 million the population of the 7-county
  CMSA is more than 3.7 million, the 10th largest
  in the U.S.

Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite
(GOES) 3.9 micron channel indicated thermal
signatures of the Houston urban heat island.
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Houstons climate is subtropical humid with very
hot and humid summers and mild winters
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Is Houston, Texas Modifying Precipitation
Patterns in Southeast Texas?
Orville et al. (2001) analyzed 12-years
(1989-2000) of ground-based lightning data for
the Houston area. They found that
1. Highest Flash Densities (gt 4 square
kilometers) are over and just downwind of the
Houston Urban area (following Orville et al.
2002).
2. Hypotheses Include (a.) Urban Heat Island-
Induced Convergence and (b) enhanced lightning
process efficiency through increased urban
pollution aerosols
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Research Hypothesis

• The central Houston Urban District and regions to
  the Northeast through Southeast exhibit enhanced
  rainfall amounts relative to sectors west of the
  city, particularly during the warm season.
• Possible mechanisms include
• Enhanced convergence zone created by Houston
  UHI-Sea Breeze-Galveston Bay Interaction in
  subtropical environment
• Enhanced convergence due to increased surface
  roughness and/or destabilization due to
  UHI-thermal perturbation of the boundary layer.
  UHI-induced convection is translated downstream
  by prevailing flow or mesoscale circulations on
  the rural-urban interface create an enhanced
  convergence zone with the prevailing
  west-southwest flow in the downwind sector
• Enhanced aerosols in Houston urban environment

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Mean Reference Wind Direction at 700 hPa is 230
(black arrow)

lt 1.7 mm/h




















1.7-2.2 mm/h












2.2-2.7 mm/h





















2.7-3.2 mm/h





















3.2-3.7 mm/h





















gt 3.7 mm/h











Houston Area with Coordinate System and Gauge
Locations
TRMM PR at 0.5 Degree with Coordinate System
Figure 3-The theoretical study coordinate
system with mean annual distribution of
TRMM-derived rainfall rates from January 1998 to
May 2002 (excluding August 2001). The orange
oval is the approximate Houston Urban Zone and is
centered on (29.75, 95.75) and (29.75, 95.25),
respectively. The black vector represents the
mean annual 700 hPa steering direction. The
pentagon-shaped box is the downwind urban
impacted region (DUIR) and the rectangular box
is the upwind control region (UCR).
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Figure 1
Annual
Warm Season
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Figure 5-Analysis of rain gauge totals from
quality-controlled gauges in a dense urban
network (e.g. within 250-km of Houston 121
Houston Flood Alert, 230 NCDC daily, 86 NCDC
hourly, and 32 NCDC 15-minute). A greater urban
influence is seen in the warm season spatial
rainfall distribution compared to the annual
rainfall distribution over the 13 year period.
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Mean Fraction of Daily Rainfall Occurring During
6-hour Increments Warm Season (1984-1997)
In the Urban Area 66 of the warm season rainfall
falls during the noon to midnight time period
compared to 55 in the Upwind Region (UR) and 60
in the Urban Impacted Region (UIR)
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Figure 9
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Figure 3
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Future Work

• Numerical modeling of Interaction of Houston
  UHI-Sea Breeze-Galveston Bay and the implications
  for rainfall modification
• Numerical modeling of ATL and Washington-Baltimore
  UHI interactions
• Engineering study updated rainfall frequency
  analysis to assess the ramifications of rainfall
  modification on urban drainage design
• Similar analyses in other cities worldwide
• SPRAWL-Studies of PRecipitation Anomalies from
  Widespread urban Landuse (2003, 2004)-ATL

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Missions..
Dr. J. Marshall Shepherd Deputy Project
Scientist, GPM
Developing International Partnerships to
Understand The Global Water and Energy Cycle and
Its Impact on Mankind
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Global Water and Energy Cycle
Goal Get P For Detecting Changes in How
Freshwater is Cycling
S
S
P,P
Cloud and Vapor Advection Processes embedded in
dynamics of the cycle
E
E
S
RO BF
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Bridging From Current to Next Generation
Space-Based, GPM Precipitation Estimates
Year 2007 How GPM Advances Current Capabilities?
Current Capabilities Year 2002-TRMM 2 SSM/I

• More accurate and physically-based global
  microwave estimates
• Precipitation products driven by need of
  stakeholders (climate scientists,
  weather/hydro-meteorological modelers, and
  algorithm developers)
• Near global coverage (65 N to 65 S)
• Measurement of frozen precipitation and lighter
  rainfall
• Improved precipitation microphysics with first
  Dual-Frequency Space-borne Radar
• Seamless extension of precipitation climatology
  for assessing global water cycle trends and
  climate change after TRMM
• Reaches applications communities such as
  freshwater resources, agriculture, health,
  emergency management, and public communications
• Multiple International Partnerships Consistent
  with recent U.N. Designation

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Why Measure Global Rainfall From Space?

• 70.9 of Earths Surface is Water
• Of the 29.1 Land-Covered, Rain Gauges and Radars
  are not uniformly distribute over land masses
• Both Gauges and Ground-Based Radar are critical
  for rainfall measurement but have
• other inherent limits (coverage, measurement
  errors, microphysics, etc.)

Typical Rain Gauge Radius (D) 4 in (0.1016
m) Area ?R2 0.03241 m2. Total Area
Covered by N 38,000 (GPCC) worldwide gauges is
1231 m2 or 35 m ? 35 m.
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GPM Reference Concept
OBJECTIVE Understand the Horizontal and
Vertical Structure of Rainfall and Its
Microphysical Element. Provide Training for
Constellation Radiometers.
OBJECTIVE Provide Enough Sampling to Reduce
Uncertainty in Short-term Rainfall Accumulations.
Extend Scientific and Societal Applications.

• Constellation Satellites
• Multiple Satellites with Microwave Radiometers
• Aggregate Revisit Time,
• 3 Hour goal
• Sun-Synchronous Polar Orbits
• 600 km Altitude

• Core Satellite
• Dual Frequency Radar
• Multi-frequency Radiometer
• H2-A Launch
• TRMM-like Spacecraft
• Non-Sun Synchronous Orbit
• 65 Inclination
• 400 - 500 km Altitude
• 4 km Horizontal Resolution (Maximum)
• 250 m Vertical Resolution

• Global Precipitation Processing Center
• Capable of Producing Global Precip Data Products
  as Defined by GPM Partners

• Precipitation Validation Sites
• Global Ground Based Rain Measurement

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From Precipitation Retrieval to Improved Weather
Prediction through more accurate precise
measurements of instantaneous rainrates better
methods of rainfall data assimilation


Models Need to Assimilate Both Precipitation Obs
Errors
Improved Weather Prediction
From Precipitation Accumulation to Improved
Hydrological Prediction through more frequent
sampling full global coverage of mw
precipitation measurements


From Intermittent Tropical MW Sampling to
3-Hour Global Coverage
Improved Flood Hazard Water Resources Prediction
From Precipitation Climatology to Improved
Climate Prediction through better closure of
water budget accompanying quantification of
accelerations/decelerations in atmospheric
surface branches of water cycle
blank
Improved Climate Prediction
Quantify Storages Fluxes
Incorporating Microphysics
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Operational and Human Scale Applications
Stakeholder (NOAA, USDA, Water Resource Agencies,
etc.) Requirements are Driving the Need for
Better Precipitation Estimates
NASAs mission is to enable, in a RD framework,
new observation and modeling assimilation
capability for future hand-off..
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Improving Hurricane Track Forecasts
Assimilation of TRMM rainfall location, intensity
and vertical structure into hurricane forecast
models leads to improvements in forecasts of
future position
Hurricane Visualization with TRMM data
Hurricane Bonnie, Atlantic, Aug 1998
5 Day Forecast Official Without
TRMM With TRMM
Dr. X. Pu, NASA GSFC
Dr. A. Hou, NASA DAO
Reduced track errors can save money (600K - 1M
per mile of coast evacuated) and save lives by
more precise prediction of eye location at
landfall
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Thoughts on ESE Outreach and Communications

• (Source Draft ESE Outreach Plan)
• ?Promote Earth Science literacy to the public and
  convey the importance and uniqueness of ESE
  activities to science understanding, societal
  applications, education and technology
  advancement
• ?Enable effective communication strategies and
  capabilities
• ?Support development of applications for use by
  stakeholders and decision-makers
• Empower internal and external intermediaries
• Help map Agency performance and products to plans.

• Key Target Audiences for ESE Outreach
• ?Public (e.g.government to citizen)
• ?Stakeholder (e.g. government to government,
  policymakers)
• ?Intermediaries (e.g. government to media,
  businesses, or value-add institutions)
• Note Many Outreach Activities will overlap with
  Informal Education activities under the auspices
  of Code N-Education Enterprise

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Leverage ESE Outreach Network
NASA Office of Earth Science
Highly Leveraged Activities
Code L
Senior Policy Analyst, Science Communications Mgr
PAO
Project Funding, ESTO Outreach
Project Formulation
Public, Stakeholder, and Intermediate Target
Groups
Applications Outreach Manager Programs
Science Research
EOS PS Office, NRAs, Post-Launch Mission Outreach
Science Research
JPL
GSFC
LaRC
MSFC
Stennis
Visualization, Informal Education, Science Writers
Visualization, Informal Education, Science Writers
Visualization, Informal Education, Science Writers
Visualization, Informal Education, Science Writers
Visualization, Informal Education, Science Writers
PAO
PAO
PAO
PAO
PAO
Centers of Capability
GSFC illustrates the model interaction between
the OES and a Center of Capability
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Many Thoughts

• For Thought How do we engage the best science
  students in Earth Sciences when they may be
  socialized to consider more traditional fields of
  medicine, engineering, etc?
• Reality Some students may such fields as more
  accessible or lucrative
• We must target Earth Science at grades 6-8, based
  on BAMS, 2002 article to enhance future pipeline
  of the next generation of Earth Scientists
• The bests Earth Scientists probably didnt major
  in Earth Sciences.
• Integrate Earth Sciences into traditional
  disciplines at 8-16 Educatioinal Levels with
  relevant cases studies and Material
• E.G. for every biology, physics, or chemistry
  class, there is an Earth Science Linkage

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