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Evaluation and intercomparison of clouds, precipitation, and radiation budgets in recent reanalyses using satellite-surface observations

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Abstract

Atmospheric reanalysis datasets offer a resource for investigating climate processes and extreme events; however, their uncertainties must first be addressed. In this study, we evaluate the five reanalyzed (20CR, CFSR, Era-Interim, JRA-25, and MERRA) cloud fraction (CF), precipitation rates (PR), and top-of-atmosphere (TOA) and surface radiation budgets using satellite observations during the period 03/2000–02/2012. Compared to the annual averaged CF of 56.7 % from CERES MODIS (CM) four of the five reanalyses underpredict CFs by 1.7–4.6 %, while 20CR overpredicts this result by 7.4 %. PR from the Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission (TRMM) is 3.0 mm/day and the reanalyzed PRs agree with TRMM within 0.1–0.6 mm/day. The shortwave (SW) and longwave (LW) TOA cloud radiative effects (CREtoa) calculated by CERES EBAF (CE) are −48.1 and 27.3 W/m2, respectively, indicating a net cooling effect of −20.8 W/m2. Of the available reanalysis results, the CFSR and MERRA calculated net CREtoa values agree with CE within 1 W/m2, while the JRA-25 result is ~10 W/m2 more negative than the CE result, predominantly due to the underpredicted magnitude of the LW warming in the JRA-25 reanalysis. A regime metric is developed using the vertical motion field at 500 hPa over the oceans. Aptly named the “ascent” and “descent” regimes, these areas are distinguishable in their characteristic synoptic patterns and the predominant cloud-types; convective-type clouds and marine boundary layer (MBL) stratocumulus clouds. In general, clouds are overpredicted (underpredicted) in the ascent (descent) regime and the biases are often larger in the ascent regime than in the descent regime. PRs are overpredicted in both regimes; however the observed and reanalyzed PRs over the ascent regime are an order of magnitude larger than those over the descent regime, indicating different types of clouds exist in these two regimes. Based upon the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program ground-based and CM satellite observations, as well as reanalyzed results, the annual CFs are 15 % higher at the Azores site than at the Nauru site (70.2 vs. 55.2 %), less SW radiation (~20 %) is transmitted the surface, and less LW radiation (~60 W/m2) is emitted back to the surface. Also, the seasonal variations in both CF and surface radiation fluxes are much smaller at the Nauru site than at the Azores site. The dichotomy between the atmospheric ascent and descent regimes is a good measure for determining which parameterization scheme requires more improvement (convective vs. MBL clouds) in these five reanalyses.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by NOAA MAPP Grant under NA13OAR4310105, NASA CERES Project under Grant NNX14AP84G and DOE ASR Project with award number DE-SC0008486 at the University of North Dakota. Ms Erica Dolinar is supported under the NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship (NESSF) Program. The reanalysis datasets are available at reanalysis.org and at http://gmao.gsfc.nasa.gov/merra/ (for MERRA). CERES-MODIS clouds, EBAF-TOA and EBAF-Surface products are produced by the NASA CERES Team, available at http://ceres.larc.nasa.gov. The ground-based observations were obtained from the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Energy Research, Office of Health and Environmental Research, Environmental Sciences Division. The data can be downloaded from http://www.archive.arm.gov/. A special thanks is extended to the anonymous reviewers who have provided excellent feedback concerning the content of this manuscript.

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  1. Department of Atmospheric Science, University of North Dakota, 4149 University Ave. Stop 9006, Grand Forks, ND, 58203-9006, USA

    Erica K. Dolinar, Xiquan Dong & Baike Xi

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  1. Erica K. Dolinar
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Dolinar, E.K., Dong, X. & Xi, B. Evaluation and intercomparison of clouds, precipitation, and radiation budgets in recent reanalyses using satellite-surface observations. Clim Dyn 46, 2123–2144 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-015-2693-z

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