Surface radiation balance in Antarctica as measured with automatic weather stations
[1] We present 4 years of near-surface radiation balance observations of four Antarctic automatic weather stations (AWS). The AWS are situated along a traverse line in Dronning Maud Land, connecting the coastal ice shelf and the inland plateau via the katabatic wind zone, covering the three major cl...
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| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
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| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.700.3078 http://www.staff.science.uu.nl/%7Ebroek112/home.php_files/Publications_MvdB/2004_vdBroeke_JGR.pdf |
| Summary: | [1] We present 4 years of near-surface radiation balance observations of four Antarctic automatic weather stations (AWS). The AWS are situated along a traverse line in Dronning Maud Land, connecting the coastal ice shelf and the inland plateau via the katabatic wind zone, covering the three major climate regimes of East Antarctica. Important differences in the radiation balance of the three regions are found. Clouds not only limit atmospheric transmissivity for shortwave radiation but also strongly enhance the albedo for the shortwave radiation that reaches the surface. As a result, the snow surface of the coastal ice shelves absorbs up to 65 % less shortwave radiation in high summer than at the high plateau, where cloudy episodes and precipitation events are less frequent. In winter, over the slopes, katabatic winds maintain a continuous turbulent transport of sensible heat toward the surface, which enhances outgoing longwave radiation. As a result, the katabatic wind zone shows the largest longwave and all-wave radiation loss in winter and over the year. Clear-sky effective emissivity for incoming longwave radiation shows great spatial variability resulting from differences in vertical |
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