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Evaluation of rainfall and atmospheric parameters during afternoon summer storms over Macaé city (Brazil) using WRF numerical model

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Abstract

Forecasting summer storms requires addressing critical atmospheric conditions to determine the potential of their development and further evolution. However, due to the high degree of variability in the development of the storms, their early detection still represents a challenge to the operational forecasters and scientific community. In this context, this study endeavored to evaluate the rainfall and atmospheric parameters simulated by the Weather, Research, and Forecasting (WRF) numerical model using three grid domains (27 km, 09 km, and 03 km). This study proposed an evaluation of precipitation and atmospheric parameters for ten summer storm events over Macaé city during the austral summer of 2020 and 2021, as initially reported by local observers. The synoptic chart data showed that the local effects, the frontal systems passages, and the South Atlantic Convergence Zone (SACZ) were related to the storms observed. From the qualitative evaluation of the precipitation simulated by WRF, we found higher values over the mountainous region of Macaé city and lower values downstream. The quantitative assessment showed that the WRF model could reproduce the hourly rainfall development, although with a tendency of underestimation compared to the observations. The mean temporal evolution of atmospheric variables over Macaé city corroborated the importance of the joint analyses of thermodynamic and dynamic parameters and the increase of horizontal grid resolution to represent better the environment favorable to storm development.

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Availability of data and material

The data used is open access. From Weather Prevision Center and Climate Studies of Brazilian National Space Research Institute (https://www.cptec.inpe.br/) and the forecast data from Global Forecast System (GFS) belonging to National Centers for Environmental Information (https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/model-data/model-datasets). This work presents figures and tables as supplementary material.

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This research does not involve human participants and/or animals.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like also to recognize the support of Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ) by means of the support through the Project FAPERJ – Edital Nº 12/2018 – PROGRAMA “Apoio às Universidades Estaduais—UERJ, UENF e UEZO—2018”—Projeto Clima e Energia Proc. n.º E-26/010.101.145/2018.

Funding

This work was supported by the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ) by means of the Project FAPERJ – Edital Nº 12/2018 – PROGRAMA “Apoio às Universidades Estaduais—UERJ, UENF e UEZO—2018”—Projeto Clima e Energia Proc. n.º E-26/010.101.145/2018.

fundação de amparo à pesquisa do estado do rio de janeiro (faperj),E-26/010.101.145/2018,Maria Gertrudes Alvarez Justi da Silva

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Meteorology, Institute of Geosciences, Universidade Federal Do Rio de Janeiro - UFRJ, CCMN ‑ Cidade Universitária - Ilha do Fundão, Avenida Athos da Silveira Ramos, 274, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, 21941‑916, Brazil

    Fabricio Polifke da Silva & Alfredo Silveira da Silva

  2. Meteorology Laboratory, Science and Technology Center, Universidade Estadual Do Norte Fluminense Darcy Ribeiro - UENF, Avenida Brenand, s.n, Imboassica, Macaé, RJ, 27925-535, Brazil

    Maria Gertrudes Alvarez Justi da Silva, Rogério Pecioli de Queiroz & Pedro Paes de Carvalho

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  1. Fabricio Polifke da Silva
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  2. Alfredo Silveira da Silva
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  3. Maria Gertrudes Alvarez Justi da Silva
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Correspondence to Fabricio Polifke da Silva.

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Appendix. Instability indices definition

Appendix. Instability indices definition

The K and TT indices show similar qualitative interpretations if the troposphere is vertically warm and wet. Meanwhile, if there is a dry atmospheric layer at 700 hPa, the TT is not affected and can represent the atmospheric instability better than the K index (Nascimento 2005). The lapse rate (LR) represents temperature variation between two atmospheric levels, and according to Nascimento (2005), the highest the LR values (generally above 6.5 °C/km) between these two layers, the greatest is the conditional atmospheric instability. The convective available potential energy (CAPE) represents a vertical integration of the difference between the Tvp and Tv from LFC to the LN. CAPE values are related to the atmospheric potential to generate deep convection if a dynamic forcing is present (Bluestein 1993; Derubertis 2006). The lifted index (LI) represents the temperature difference between a lifted parcel and the air at 500 hPa, and negative LI characterizes an environment favorable to convective storms (Galway 1956). Precipitable water (PW) would be the water depth in a column of the atmosphere if all water in that column were precipitated as rain. Velocity convergence at 850 hPa (CV850), velocity divergence at 250 hPa (DV250), wind shear (WS) between winds at 10 m and 500 hPa, relative vorticity (VT500), and upward vertical motion (W500) at 500 hPa can be related with the dynamic mechanisms required to provide upward air motion (Doswell 1987; Tajbakhsh et al. 2012) upwards.

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da Silva, F., da Silva, A., Justi da Silva, M. et al. Evaluation of rainfall and atmospheric parameters during afternoon summer storms over Macaé city (Brazil) using WRF numerical model. Bull. of Atmos. Sci.& Technol. 2, 12 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42865-021-00044-7

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