ESRL : PSD : Clouds and Climate 3/12/18, 9)02 PM

Clouds and Climate

» Clouds and Climate

Clouds play a vital role in our climate by regulating the amount of solar
energy that reaches the surface and the amount of the Earth's energy that
is radiated back into space. The more energy that is trapped by the planet,
the warmer our climate will grow. If less energy is collected, the climate
will become cooler. Understanding this energy balance is fundamental to
answering any of the questions posed by climate change.

The Earth's atmosphere has seen large variations in it's history, but only
recently have climatologists been finding signs that human activity on the
planet is causing climate change. To forecast the impact and severity of
these changes, climatologists run computer simulations based on our
understanding of the physical dynamics of the environment. These models
must include all aspects of the atmosphere, surface and oceans which effect
this balance in order to improve the accuracy of their predictions. Clouds
are not well represented in these models due to a limited understanding of
their energy characteristics (how well they absorb or reflect energy) and
distribution (where and how many clouds there are).

What questions do climate researchers ask about

clouds?

How many layers of clouds are there? How much does it rain?
Are the clouds made of ice or water? Snow?
At what altitude is the cloud base? Cloud top? How large are the water
dropplets or ice crystals in the
cloud?
What fraction of the sky is cloudy?

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Figure 1: Energy can be absorbed, reflected or transmitted

by clouds.

Figure 2: Radar image showing different phases of water in

the arctic atmosphere: Ice clouds, water clouds and snow.

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Figure 3: Lidar image showing the mixed phase of arctic

clouds, containing both water and ice

Cloud Characteristics

Depending on their altitude, structure and composition (ice or water)

clouds will regulate energy differently. One cloud may trap heat by
reflecting energy back to the surface. Another may reflect sunlight and
cause the surface to cool. You may have noticed that a cloudless night can
be much colder than a cloudy night. Without the heating of the sun and a
layer of clouds to insulate us, the surface radiates more heat into space on
cloudless nights, making them colder.

To study these characteristics, researchers combine data from a variety of

instruments to form a complete understanding of cloud radiative
properties. Instruments used to study clouds include:

MilliMeter Cloud Radar (MMCR) developed at PSD uses

electromagnetic waves to determine the characteristics of cloud particles
from radar reflectivity which is the strength of the signal reflected from
the cloud particles. The MMCR can also measure particle velocity, which is

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determined from the Doppler shift that the particle motion adds to the
returned signal. The MMCR was specially designed to detect non-
precipitating and weakly precipitating clouds, which have a major impact
on climate. This makes it very different from the longer wavelength,
weather radars you might see on television which are designed to detect
rain, snow and hail.

Depolarization And Backscatter Unattended Lidar (DABUL)

developed at PSD uses a laser to measure very weak clouds as well as
aerosol particles. DABUL can also distinguish the phase of a cloud, in
other words, whether the clouds is made of water dropplets or ice crystals.

Figure 2 and 3 are data taken in the Arctic demonstrates how complex
clouds can be with multiple layers of ice and water regions. To distinguish
between an ice cloud and a water cloud, scientists combine data from the
MMCR and DABUL to determine the cloud boundaries, phase and particle
distribution. The DABUL's laser becomes completely absorbed by the
water in the clouds, which appear as bright orange bars.

How many clouds are there?

The distribution of clouds also plays an important role in regulating our

climate. By knowing how much of the Earth is covered with clouds,
climatologists can improve their models and watch for signs of climate
change. Increases or decreases in the number and type of clouds could
indicate that climate feedback loops are at work cooling or warming the
planet.

Counting clouds however is not easily done. From space, satllites are
limited to seeing the tops of clouds and many clouds are smaller than the
satllite footprint. (A footprint is the horizontal dimentions of a satllite
measurement, which can be tens of kilometers along a side.)

From the surface, cloud observations have traditionally been made by a

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human observer, which are often very inacurate, especially at night. Radars
and lidars are much more accurate. However, because the technology is
new and expensive there are only a handful of these instruments operating.
Surface observations will always be limited in harsh, sparsely inhabited
environments. This problem is being addressed by speciallized field
programs which study clouds in these environments.

Clouds in the Arctic

Fine ice crystals in the cold, dry air of the Arctic

refract light into an icebow.

One such program, the Surface Heat Budget of the Arctic Ocean (SHEBA),
at the University of Washington was designed to address the scarcity of
climate data in the Arctic. The Arctic is a critical climate zone due the
extremes of solar energy it receives and the effects it can have on the
surrounding oceans. During SHEBA, researchers spent a year on the ice of
the Arctic Ocean, measuring the energy exchanges between the ocean, the
ice and the atmosphere. A critical component of the atmospheric
measurements were the cloud observations made with the MMCR and
DABUL.

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Cumulus in the tropical western Pacific.

Clouds in the Tropics

In another sparsely inhabited climate zone, the Tropical Western Pacific

(TWP), the PSD MMCR and DABUL will make identical measurements of
tropical clouds. Deployed on the deck of the NOAA Ronald H. Brown,
clouds measurements will be taken as part of the JASMINE and Nauru99
programs The TWP is considered the "furnace" of the planet, absorbing
solar energy and converting it into atmospheric water vapor (clouds).
Climate change in the TWP impacts world wide weather as has been
dramatically demonstrated by El Niño.

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