Quantifying Boundary Layer Water Vapor with Near-Infrared and Microwave Imagery

Abstract:

This study investigates the synergy of collocated microwave radiometry and near-infrared imagery to estimate the planetary boundary layer water vapor. Microwave radiometry provides the total column water vapor, while the near-infrared imagery provides the water vapor above the cloud layers. The difference between the two gives the vapor between the surface and the cloud top, which may be interpreted as the boundary layer water vapor. In combining the two data sets, we apply several flags as well as proximity tests to remove pixels with high clouds and / or intrapixel heterogeneity. Comparisons against radiosondes (MAGIC, VOCALS-REX, etc) and ECMWF reanalysis data demonstrate the robustness of these boundary layer water vapor estimates. It is shown that the measured AMSR-MODIS boundary layer water vapor can be analyzed using sea surface temperature and cloud top pressure information by employing simple equations based on the Clausius-Clapeyron relationship.