Meteorol Atmos Phys 87, 57–88 (2004)

DOI 10.1007/s00703-003-0061-8

1
Vaisala Inc., Boulder, CO
2
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Boulder, CO
3
National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO
4
AeroVironment Inc., Monrovia, CA

Advances in meteorological instrumentation

for air quality and emergency response
W. F. Dabberdt1 , G. L. Frederick1 , R. M. Hardesty2, W.-C. Lee3 , and K. Underwood4

With 20 Figures

Received August 29, 2003; accepted September 25, 2003

Published online: June 2, 2004 # Springer-Verlag 2004

Summary result of 2002 congressional action1 , which man-

Air quality forecasting and emergency response are receiving
increasing emphasis in the US and elsewhere; both share
similar but not identical needs for advanced meteorological
observations. At the same time, there has been a steady
increase in the performance characteristics of ground-based
remote sensing systems as well as ground-based and airborne
in situ measurement systems. The structure of the planetary
boundary layer is summarized in the context of implications
for transport and diffusion, along with the measurement
requirements for dispersion modeling. We then review the
current state-of-the-art of operational and quasi-operational
measurement systems with a focus on boundary layer
measurements. Measurement systems discussed include:
meteorological radar, radar wind profilers, radio acoustic
sounding systems, lidar, sodar, GPS receivers, micro-
wave radiometers, radiosonde systems, commercial air-
craft measurements, and traditional near-surface in situ
sensors.
1. Introduction
Air quality forecasting and emergency response
are receiving increasing emphasis in the US; both
share similar but not identical needs for advanced
meteorological observations. The emerging em-
phasis in the U.S. on air quality forecasting is the
dates that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) provide routine opera-
tional nationwide forecasts for ozone and fine
particles. Initial limited-area ozone forecasts are
to begin in 2004 in New England with extension
in subsequent years to the rest of the country and
also to fine particles. Meteorological measure-
ment needs in support of emergency response
are a result of increased emphasis on accidental
spills of industrial chemicals and homeland
security concerns arising out of the terrorist
actions of September 11, 2001.
Meteorological observations are critical for
analyzing and predicting atmospheric dispersion
of gases and particles. Depending upon which
dispersion variables (e.g., transport, diffusion,
stability, deposition, plume rise) are important
for a particular problem, a corresponding suite
of meteorological parameters must be quantified
through observation, modeling or a combination.
These parameters can include wind speed and
1
H.R. 4 Energy Policy Act of 2002, Senate Amendment S. 517,
SA 1383, Forecasts and Warnings.
58 W. F. Dabberdt et al

Table 1. Candidate meteorological observing systems for dispersion applications

Dispersion variables Meteorological variables Candidate measurement systems

(not all required; algorithm dependent)

Transport Three-dimensional Profilers; Doppler weather radar;

fields of wind speed and RAOBs; mesonets; aircraft;
wind direction tethersonde; Doppler lidar
Diffusion Turbulence; wind speed 3-D sonic anemometers; cup & vane
variance; wind direction anemometers; RAOBs; profilers;
variance; stability; lapse RASS; scanning microwave
rate; mixing height; radiometer (maybe); tethersonde
surface roughness
Stability Temperature gradient; Towers; ceilometers; profiler=RASS;
heat flux; cloud cover; RAOBs; aircraft; tethersonde; net
insolation or net radiometers; pyranometers;
radiation; pyrgeometers
Deposition, wet Precipitation rate; Weather radar (polarimetric); cloud
phase; size distribution radar; profilers
Deposition, dry Turbulence; surface See turbulence
roughness
Plume rise Wind speed; Profilers=RASS; RAOBs; lidar;
temperature profile; ceilometer; tethersonde; aircraft
mixing height; stability
RAOB – rawinsonde observation
RASS – radio acoustic sounding system

direction, temperature, humidity, precipitation type
and intensity, mixing height, turbulence, and
energy fluxes. Table 1 summarizes measurement
requirements according to the associated disper-
sion and meteorological variables. The specific
variables that must be measured are a function
of the algorithms and parameterizations used
in the dispersion model. Because of their height
variability in the boundary layer, vertical profiles
of many parameters are important. In the same
way, spatial variability of the dispersion variables
may necessitate multiple observing sites, model
parameterizations or judicious combinations of
measurements and modeling. The objective of
this overview is to provide a review of the current
state-of-instrumentation for dispersion and air
quality modeling. The primary focus is on
advances in measurement devices and associated
algorithms, with particular emphasis on advances
that have been or soon will be implemented in
operational measurement systems. This review
also emphasizes the meteorological aspects of
air quality and emergency response within the
planetary boundary layer (PBL). While many of
the measurement systems considered here also
provide useful observations above the PBL, those
systems that are not currently appropriate for
PBL measurements are excluded. Satellites are
one such example of systems that are not
included although this may change in the future.
We first summarize some of the more relevant
aspects of the PBL. Next we consider in situ
measurement devices and systems, including
advances in both fixed-level near-surface instru-
ments and in situ profiling systems. These are
followed by a review of advances in remote sen-
sing systems. And finally, we offer observations
on the future of operational meteorological mea-
surement systems, both for air quality and emer-
gency-response applications.
2. Background
2.1 Characteristics of the planetary
boundary layer (PBL)2
The planetary boundary layer (PBL) is bounded
below by the Earth’s surface, and is usually
capped aloft by a statically stable layer of vary-
ing intensity. The capping inversion is frequently
2
Based on an extended discussion in Dabberdt et al (2003).
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
the result of large-scale subsidence that sepa-
rates the PBL from the rest of the free tropo-
sphere. The PBL depth – usually defined as the
height of the base of the capping inversion – is
variable in time and space, and typically ranges
up to several kilometers in clear-sky daytime
conditions over land. However, the PBL is not
always well defined as in the presence of frontal
boundaries, deep convection, or multiple low-
level inversions; also, the nocturnal PBL is fre-
quently difficult to define.
The so-called mixing or mixed layer is an
important feature of the PBL. By definition
(Glickman, 2000) the mixed layer is a ‘‘type of
atmospheric boundary layer characterized by
vigorous turbulence tending to stir and [after trav-
el times of more than 10 or 20 minutes] uni-
formly mix, primarily in the vertical, quantities
such as conservative tracer concentrations,
potential temperature, and momentum or wind
speed.’’ The turbulence can result from forced
convection caused by strong winds or wind shear
that generate mechanical turbulence or from free
convection due to buoyancy. Buoyantly gener-
ated mixed layers are usually statically unstable,
caused by heating at the earth’s surface or radia-
tive cooling at the tops of cloud or fog layers.
Mixed layers typically are in contact with the
Earth’s surface, and their vertical extent then
defines the atmospheric mixing depth. But at
other times, particularly at night, mixing layers
can occur aloft.
The classic land-based mixed layer (see Fig. 1)
evolves in several phases over the course of a
typical fair-weather day. In the early morning,
the mixed layer is shallow and capped by the
remnants of the residual stable boundary layer
Fig. 1. Schematic of mixed-layer evolution (Stull, 1988)
59
from the previous (clear) night. The so-called
residual layer is the middle portion of the
nocturnal atmospheric boundary layer that is
characterized by weak, sporadic turbulence; it is
initially uniformly mixed with respect to poten-
tial temperature and pollutants that remain from
the mixed layer of the previous day. In mid-to-
late morning, the top of the mixed layer grows
rapidly through the residual layer as heating
eliminates the nocturnal inversion. The next
phase occurs in the late morning and afternoon
with the presence of a deep convective boundary
layer of relatively constant depth (order of
1–2 km). During the ensuing nighttime, the bot-
tom of the surface-based mixed layer is trans-
formed into a statically stable boundary layer
by contact with the radiatively cooled surface.
The depth, structure and evolution of the
mixed layer(s) in urban areas are different than
in rural areas as a consequence of changes in the
thermal and aerodynamic characteristics of the
surface, the flux of anthropogenic sensible heat,
and changes in the availability of water vapor.
The characteristics of the mixed layer(s) and
the PBL are also different over geographic
regions with variations in the underlying surface,
such as coastal areas, mountainous areas, and
irrigated cropland. In contrast to the classic
model of mixed-layer evolution, actual mixed-
layer structure and variability can be quite
different.
The description and prediction of the planetary
boundary layer and the mixed layer present a
number of scientific and measurement chal-
lenges. The dynamic nature of the PBL (Stull,
1988) influences the concentration and residence
time of pollutants and hence air quality. How-
ever, incomplete knowledge of the physical influ-
ences on PBL structure (including the presence,
extent and intensity of mixed layers), as it
changes both spatially over different patchworks
of land cover=land use and temporally through
the day and the year, are limiting factors in accu-
rately predicting air quality conditions.
2.2 Importance of PBL in dispersion
modeling
The height, zi, of the PBL is particularly impor-
tant for air quality forecasts and emergency
response predictions because it imposes a limit
60 W. F. Dabberdt et al
to vertical dispersion, and is a fundamental scal-
ing length for characterizing the structure of
the neutral and convective boundary layer. The
strength of the capping inversion at zi, the pres-
ence of clouds, and the rate of growth (or
destruction) of the inversion strongly determine
the vertical transport or diffusion of pollutants
upward to the free troposphere or downward
from the free troposphere to the boundary layer.
The magnitude of these vertical fluxes is not well
known, but is important for many problems such
as regional photochemical and particulate-matter
models.
The collapse of zi in the late afternoon is
not satisfactorily understood. Preliminary studies
(Ching et al, 1981; Hanna and Chang, 1992) indi-
cate that the turbulence first dies away at the top
of the PBL. The problem is compounded because
zi is not easily estimated in those cases where
there is no well-defined capping inversion.
Instead multiple weak inversions may exist. At
night zi can be very small (a few meters with
nearly calm winds and clear skies), yet many
air quality modeling systems arbitrarily impose
a minimum zi of 100 or 200 m to avoid problems
with constrained vertical mixing.
2.3 PBL measurement challenges
The vertical structure and height of the PBL can
be determined from vertical profiles of tempera-
ture, moisture, aerosols, turbulence, and other
properties. However, there are difficulties in
observing zi because it is often ambiguous and
the various in situ and remote sounders have dif-
ferent sampling limitations (e.g., different radar
profilers have different minimum and maximum
ranges, and range resolution). The challenge is to
measure both the lowest portions of the nocturnal
PBL and the upper reaches of the capping stable
layer with sufficient height resolution and
temporal continuity. These demanding sampling
requirements can only be resolved with multi-
component measurement systems that use both
UHF profilers to address the long-range chal-
lenge of measuring the top of the PBL and opti-
cal or acoustic profilers to sample the very lowest
nocturnal layers. Also, emerging multi-frequency
radar wind profiler technology (Palmer et al,
1999) offers significant promise to provide
height resolution that is an order of magnitude
better than current single-frequency profiling
systems.
Currently, there is no nation-wide network that
routinely monitors the diurnal variation of the
height and structure of the PBL. The most com-
prehensive measurement system is the NWS
upper-air RAOB network, which provides twice
daily (00 and 12GMT) in situ soundings of
winds, pressure, temperature and humidity. But
the RAOB network is sparse for air quality pur-
poses (in 1999 there were 100 stations in the
U.S. with average separation of 315 km). These
stations only report data for mandatory and sig-
nificant levels in near real time, although high-
resolution data are available in archive mode
(height resolution varies from 5 to 30 m depend-
ing on the type of sounding system used). Thus
the vertical and temporal resolution of the real-
time operational RAOB data is poor for the con-
tinuous determination of mixing layer depth and
its diurnal evolution. Currently there are efforts
within the national meteorological services to
provide high-resolution soundings as a standard
feature of the operational upper-air reports.
Boundary layer UHF wind profilers are better
matched to the PBL monitoring requirements
and are beginning to become more numerous,
although there are still only about 85 operational
systems in North America. Soundings of winds,
pressure and temperature from commercial air-
craft (during takeoff and landing) are a valuable
source of profile data near the urban boundary
layer (Moninger et al, 2003). The frequency of
aircraft soundings available at major airports is
much greater than the RAOB network, but the
height resolution is poorer. Also, most of these
major airports are situated outside the urban area,
thus providing soundings of the nearby environ-
ment but not the urban boundary layer.
A number of different approaches exist to
determine mixing height. It is important to
emphasize that the methods are closely con-
nected to the profiling instruments that are used
(Gryning and Batchvarova, 2001). Seibert et al
(2000) discuss measurement platforms and their
relative merits for determining mixing height.
The lack of a single method has led to ambigu-
ities when mixing heights determined from
different theoretical models and measuring plat-
forms are compared (Gryning and Batchvarova,
2001). It is important that explicit attention is
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
given to the method used by models to derive
mixing height (e.g., Bianco and Wilczak, 2002).
A further issue related to spatial resolution
arises when comparing observed and modeled
mixing heights. The nature of the surface from
which zi measurements are determined (the
source area) is time dependent as is the mixing
height itself (Cleugh and Grimmond, 2001). If
the area is relatively homogeneous, then the mix-
ing height source area may be fairly uniform
(Zutter et al, 2002). However if the area is more
heterogeneous, then there may be some patch-
work of the surface, such as exists in many urban
areas (Cleugh and Grimmond, 2001). This com-
plexity of the surface needs to be considered
both in interpreting observations and evaluating
models.
3. In situ surface measurements
In situ surface-based observations of wind, tur-
bulence, temperature and humidity are typically
measured using meteorological towers ranging in
height from 6 to 10 m. Mechanical wind sensors
(bivanes, propeller vanes, etc) have been used for
decades and their performance has improved
steadily over this time while sonic anemometers
have come into widespread operational use over
the past few years. Temperature can be measured
to acceptable accuracy and precision by any of
several different methods (for example, using
thermistors and resistance and capacitance sen-
sors) provided the probe is well shielded from
solar insolation and properly ventilated. The ver-
tical temperature gradient over the height of the
tower is an important measurement for determin-
ing atmospheric stability and estimating turbu-
lence. Typically, temperature gradients are
measured using thermocouples or platinum resis-
tance thermometers. Humidity or water vapor
mixing ratio is a more difficult measurement,
but still can be made with acceptable accuracy
and precision as well. The two most common
methods are thin-film capacitance sensors and
dew point measuring devices. Though less com-
mon, meteorological towers can also be instru-
mented to measure sensible and latent heat
fluxes and radiative fluxes, as well as a number
of other relevant meteorological and chemical
variables. Excellent references are available that
describe the measurement physics and perfor-
61
mance specifications for traditional wind,
temperature and humidity instruments; these
include Brock and Richardson (2001), Dobson,
Hasse and Davis (1980), Lenschow (1986),
Fritschen and Gay (1979), Fraden (1996),
Schwerdtfeger (1996), DeFelice (1998), Mason
and Modes (1984), Simidchiev (1986), WMO
(1983), Wylie and Lalas (1992), Webster
(1999), and Wolf and Mercanti (1974). A com-
prehensive field intercomparison study of five
mechanical wind sensors and one sonic wind
sensor used for turbulence measurements was
prepared by Kaimal et al (1984). Some of the
previous references also deal with solar and
terrestrial radiation measurement devices, while
Coulson (1975) reviews them exclusively, ad-
dressing measurement principles, methods of
measurements, and field measurement aspects.
There is no common set of performance char-
acteristics that are universally adopted for all
measurement applications. However, meteorolog-
ical sensor standards have been adopted for use
by all Federal agencies in the U.S., as described
in the Federal Meteorological Handbook, Num-
ber 1 (FCM-H1, 1995); see Appendix A.1. These
standards are consistent with standards estab-
lished by the World Meteorological Organization
and are applicable to all types of reporting
stations that take meteorological observations:
automated, augmented, and manual. Individual
agencies in the U.S. may issue their own observ-
ing procedures that implement the FMH-1 stan-
dards. Such procedures can complement, but
must not relax, the standards contained in
FMH-1 (i.e., their standards may be stricter). In
this way, specific measurement standards have
been developed for several major applications.
One example is the in situ measurement system
performance characteristics that are recom-
mended by the US Environmental Protection
Agency (U.S. EPA, 2000) for use in conjunction
with atmospheric dispersion characterization and
modeling that are summarized in Appendix A.2.
In the area of meteorology for nuclear power
applications, the American Nuclear Society and
the American Nuclear Standards Institute have
developed their own standards (ANSI=ANS-
3.11, 2000). These standards (Appendix A.3)
are very comprehensive and they are especially
relevant to dispersion and air quality because
they were developed specifically in response to
62
Table 2. Classification of sonic anemometers (Foken and Oncley, 1995)
Sonic anemometer class
A Fundamental research
B General use for flux measurements
C General use for wind measurements
Notes:
Classes A and B are 3-D devices; Class C may be 2-D or 3-D
Vh is the speed of the horizontal wind

w 2 is the standard deviation of the vertical component of the wind
u is the friction velocity
< w0 Ts 0 > is the vertical temperature flux
the dispersion measurement requirements of
the nuclear power industry. Other standards
are currently being prepared by Technical
Committee 146 (Subcommittee 5) of the Interna-
tional Standards Organization (www.iso.ch).
These new ISO standards will cover wind vanes
and rotating anemometers; sonic anemome-
ters=thermometers; test methods for comparing
the performance of radiation shields; evaluation
methods for atmospheric dispersion models; and
remote atmospheric boundary layer profiling.
Sonic anemometers warrant additional consid-
eration because their performance and reliability
have improved significantly over the past decade
and they are finding increasing use as operational
all-weather instruments for many applications.
Sonic anemometers determine the vector wind
by measuring the transit time between pairs or
triads of acoustic transducers. The difference in
the bi-directional transit time is directly propor-
tional to the wind speed along each path with a
small dependence on temperature and humidity.
Some also measure temperature from the one-
way transit time and the known dependence of
the speed of sound on temperature. Sonic ane-
mometers have several advantages over mechani-
cal wind sensors. Since they have no moving
parts, they do not have problems of threshold
(starting) speeds or overshooting, and their fre-
quency-response is greater so that they are better
suited to making turbulence and flux measure-
W. F. Dabberdt et al
Parameters for classification
Vh; b ¼ 1.00
0.03, R2 > 0.95

w 2 ; b ¼ 1.00
0.03, R2 > 0.90
u ; b ¼ 1.00
0.05, R2 > 0.85
< w0 Ts 0 > ; b ¼ 1.00
0.05, R2 > 0.95
Vh; b ¼ 1.00
0.05, R2 > 0.90

w 2 ; b ¼ 1.00
0.10, R2 > 0.85
u ; b ¼ 1.00
0.25, R2 > 0.75
< w0 Ts 0 > ; b ¼ 1.00
0.20, R2 > 0.85
Vh; b ¼ 1.00
0.05, R2 > 0.90
ments. Although relatively minor problems,
some sonics are susceptible to shadowing effects
(by the upwind transducer and the supporting
structures) and electronic delays in the response
of the transducers. Wieser et al (2001) have
investigated the aerodynamic influences of
sensor design on wind measurements with
three commercial three-dimensional sonic ane-
mometers. Foken and Oncley (1995) and Mauder
and Foken (2003) proposed a three-tier classifi-
cation scheme for sonic anemometers. Recently,
Mauder and Foken (2001) evaluated with field
measurements various commercial three-dimen-
sional sonic anemometers and proposed quanti-
tative performance measures according to this
scheme. Table 2 summarizes the classification
scheme and the performance bands for each tier
of instrument. Commercial sonic anemometers
have come into widespread operational use
over the past few years with perhaps the most
notable example being their integration into the
U.S. Automated Surface Observing System in
2003.
4. In situ upper-air measurements
In situ upper-air measurement systems that are
directly applicable to dispersion and air quality
modeling include radiosondes, rocketsondes,
tethersondes, commercial aircraft, and unmanned
aerial vehicles (UAVs).
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response 63

4.1 Radiosondes approximately one-half million radiosondes used

annually are manufactured by less than ten com-
Radiosondes3 are expendable balloon-borne
panies worldwide. The meteorological commu-
devices that measure meteorological state vari-
nity has been assigned two radio frequency
ables and sometimes winds, transmitting the data
bands for transmitting meteorological data:
in real time to a ground-based receiving and pro-
400–406 MHz and 1675–1700 MHz.
cessing station. Operational radiosonde observa-
All of the world’s radiosondes are required to
tions (RAOBs) ascend to heights of about 30 km
meet certain minimum performance standards
(11 hectopascals, hPa) at a rate of about
established by the WMO; see Appendix A.4.
5 ms1 . When the device also measures winds,
Thermodynamic sensors vary widely among
it is more properly called a rawinsonde, although
radiosondes currently in use throughout the
the term radiosonde is commonly applied to
world. Temperature sensors are of four designs:
both. In some cases, a balloon without a radio-
capacitance sensors, thermistors, resistance wires,
sonde (called a pilot balloon or pibal) is tracked
and bimetallic elements. The two common hu-
by either optical or radio techniques to profile
midity elements are carbon hygristors and pla-
only winds. During the period September 1971
nar thin-film capacitance sensors, although gold
through May 1973, NOAA operated special
beater’s skin is still used in Russia and China.
environmental meteorological support units
Pressure measurements are typically made with
(EMSUs) in major metropolitan areas (Barbato,
either an aneroid cell or a piezoresistance
1978). These units launched slow-ascent RAOBs
element.
daily at 0500LST and 1000LST (in addition to
The accuracy of radiosonde data is a com-
the standard 0000Z and 1200Z soundings) for
bination of factors: sensor performance; related
the purpose of measuring mixing height and the
transducer electronics; mechanical construction
ventilation wind speed to aid in air pollution
of the sonde and sensor housing; sensor and
forecasting. Soundings were obtained only to a
sensor-boom coatings and treatments; calibration
height of 3 km agl, but had very high vertical
technology; and calibration and correction
resolution (50 m). Although the EMSU program
algorithms. In addition to issues of radiosonde
was extremely valuable for air quality forecast-
performance, the uncertainty of upper-air mea-
ing, it was terminated due to budgetary con-
surements includes sampling considerations,
straints; there is no equivalent operational
such as the density of the observation network,
sounding program at present.
time interval between observations, representa-
Shortly after an operational upper-air sounding
tiveness of a near-instantaneous profile, and the
is completed, a standard data message is pre-
homogeneity of the atmosphere.
pared and made available to all nations using
Some radiosonde manufacturers offer optional
the Global Telecommunications System. These
sensors to make supplemental environmental
TEMP messages are transmitted in a universal
measurements. Measurements of ozone con-
format that reports meteorological conditions at
centration and radioactivity are the two most
various standard or so-called mandatory (pres-
common supplemental measurements. The most
sure) levels as well as at significant levels, which
common radiosonde ozone sensor is the electro-
represent levels where prescribed changes in
chemical type that is capable of measuring the
meteorological conditions occur.
vertical distribution of atmospheric ozone up to
The radiosonde is an electronics unit that
3 hPa. The uncertainty of the ozone measurement
includes a suite of sophisticated in situ meteoro-
is of order 5–10% of the local values.
logical sensors, signal processing electronics,
There are several radiosonde windfinding tech-
and radio transmitter. The meteorological mea-
niques; all measure wind from the drift of the
surements are made at intervals that vary from
balloon. One class of wind measurement tech-
one-half to six seconds depending on the type
niques tracks the balloon externally using one
and manufacturer of the radiosonde. The
of three methods: (1) optical systems use a theo-
3
dolite to visually track the balloon’s azimuth and
Dabberdt et al (2002) summarize the history and state-of-the-art
of in situ atmospheric sounding systems, including radiosondes, elevation; (2) radio theodolites track a radio sig-
dropsondes, and rocketsonde systems. nal from a transmitter on the radiosonde; and
64 W. F. Dabberdt et al
(3) radar systems track a radar retroreflector sus-
pended from the balloon. The second class of
wind measurement techniques uses a navigation
receiver that is internal to the radiosonde. Earlier
systems used the LORAN-C navigation system
or various VLF systems, such as the Russian
ALPHA system, the US Navy’s VLF system
and the now-defunct Omega system. Radio-
sondes are now beginning to use Global Position-
ing System receivers for wind finding with one of
two methods. In one, a codeless GPS receiver
inside the radiosonde accurately measures the
horizontal and vertical Doppler velocity of the
radiosonde with respect to GPS satellites. In
the code-correlating type, the GPS receiver also
determines the latitude, longitude and altitude of
the radiosonde. Two major advantages of the
GPS-based techniques are the high accuracy
and precision of the wind measurements together
with the worldwide coverage of GPS.
4.2 Rocketsonde
The rocketsonde employs a small rocket to carry
a special radiosonde to the desired deployment
altitude where the sonde is ejected and floats to
earth on a small parachute. Available low-alti-
tude rocketsondes (Vaisala, 2002) measure only
thermodynamic variables in the lower one-to-
three kilometers of the atmosphere. They are
easy to use, and can be prepared for launch in
less than 10 minutes. Apogee is reached in less
than 20 seconds, and a detailed thermodynamic
profile is obtained with 1-sec resolution. Vertical
resolution depends on the descent rate (typically
3 ms1 ) and sensor response time. Because of
their high portability and ease of use, the rock-
etsonde can be useful for emergency-response
applications.
4.3 Tethersonde
Tethersonde meteorological sounding systems
consist of three components: (1) in situ measure-
ment and telemetry devices called tethersondes,
(2) the support system consisting of an aerody-
namic balloon, tether line, and motorized winch,
and (3) a ground-based data acquisition, process-
ing and display system. Current boundary layer
systems (Shellhorn, 2003) can sample at up to six
levels and up to a height of about 1 km agl in
wind speeds up to 15 ms1 . Winds are measured
with a propeller vane, and state variables are
sampled with radiosonde sensors; the sampling
rate is 1 Hz. The tethersonde has additional chan-
nels that permit addition of chemical (e.g., ozone)
or other meteorological sensors.
4.4 Commercial aircraft
Operational meteorological measurements from
aircraft began in 1919 when the U.S. Weather
Bureau attached aerometeographs to wing struts
(Hughes and Gedzelman, 1995). In 1986, the first
real-time operational system (AMDAR – auto-
mated meteorological reports from aircraft)
began service in Australia. Today, AMDAR sys-
tems (in the U.S., they are also called ACARS
for the Aircraft Communication Addressing and
Reporting System used to report the data) are
operated by 15 airlines from nine countries: Aus-
tralia, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New
Zealand, South Africa, Sweden, the United King-
dom and the United States; all systems have
some degree of government support. Moninger
et al (2003) summarize the current status of
meteorological observations from commercial
aircraft. Of special interest for dispersion appli-
cations are soundings that are obtained up to
25,000 feet (7.62 km) during ascent from and
descent to major airports. Not all AMDAR air-
craft provide sounding data – some provide only
flight-level data – and the temporal distribution
of these soundings varies by time of day, day of
the week, and weather conditions. Figure 2
shows all AMDAR=ACARS soundings for a sin-
gle day across the contiguous U.S., while Fig. 3
illustrates a sounding that shows an elevated
inversion that resulted from the erosion of a
nocturnal surface-based inversion. Currently
measured variables include pressure, temperature
and winds with some aircraft also reporting tur-
bulence (as either eddy dissipation rate or verti-
cal acceleration). Humidity measurements are
being evaluated with plans in the U.S. to equip
35 aircrafts in 2003 (Moninger et al, 2003;
Fleming, 2000). This second-generation aircraft
water vapor sensing system (WVSS) will measure
water vapor mixing ratio directly using a single
mode diode laser (Fleming et al, 2002). The
performance specifications for aircraft sounding
measurements are indicated in Appendix A.5;
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response 65

Fig. 2. ACARS coverage over

the CONUS below 25,000 ft,
color coded by altitude, 27
March 2002 (courtesy of
Moninger et al, 2003)

Fig. 3. ACARS sounding from

1623 UTC, 5 May 1997, at
Chicago O’Hare International
Airport showing that surface
heating has caused the inversion
to lift (courtesy of Moninger
et al, 2003)

the height resolution varies by aircraft and
carrier, ranging from 90 to 300 m depending on
the carrier and mode (ascent provides higher
resolution).
4.5 Robotic aircraft
Uninhabited air vehicles or unmanned aerial
vehicles (UAVs) are aircraft that have been
designed to operate without an onboard pilot.
There are more than 150 different UAV models
either in operation or development in the world
today (see www.uavforum.com). They can be
remotely piloted or completely autonomous,
fixed-wing or rotary-wing aircraft, jet or piston
powered, and they can range in size from
inches to hundreds of feet. Applications include
reconnaissance and surveillance, weather and
66 W. F. Dabberdt et al
atmospheric research, and military combat (see
NRC, 2000). Many offer the potential to serve
as meteorological and chemical sampling plat-
forms in support of emergency response events.
Holland et al (2001) describe a small, inexpen-
sive remotely piloted UAV designed especially
for environmental observations. The Mark 3
Aerosonde has a wingspan of 2.9 m and has a
maximum payload of 5 kg with 2 kg of fuel; it
cruises at 20–32 ms1 and climbs at 4 ms1 with
maximum endurance more than 40 h. Standard
meteorological measurements include tempera-
ture, pressure and humidity that are sampled at
1–10 s. Winds are derived from GPS-measured
ground speed, airspeed, and a ‘‘short turning
maneuver,’’ and are available with 300-m and
10–30-s resolution. Future plans are exploring a
variety of chemical and additional meteorologi-
cal measurements. Because of its robotic control
and high maneuverability, UAVs offer significant
benefits for supporting responses to accidental or
deliberate releases of chemical, biological or
radioactive materials.
5. Remote sensing
Remote sensing techniques are finding increasing
use as an operational method to obtain vertical
(and horizontal) profiles in the troposphere. Table 3
summarizes data quality targets for regulatory
air quality modeling applications as recom-
mended by EPA (2000) for various active
remote-sensing and upper-air in situ measure-
Table 3. U.S. EPA data quality objectives for various upper-air measurement systems for regulatory air quality modeling
applications (EPA, 2000)
Radiosonde p:
0.5 hPa
T:
0.2 C
RH:
10%
u, v:
0.5–1 m=s
Sodar (b) u, v:
1 m=s
WS:
1 m=s
WD:
10
Radar wind profiler (b) u, v:
1 m=s
WS:
1 m=s
WD:
10
RASS Tv:
1 C
(a) Over WS range 3 to 21 m=s
(b) For wind speeds > 2 m=s
ment systems: radar wind profilers, RASS, sodar
and RAOBs. These targets are useful in a general
sense, but they fail to address the full suite of
operational measurements systems that are avail-
able today to probe the boundary layer and the
overlying lower troposphere. Available opera-
tional systems also include lidar and meteoro-
logical radar, and passive remote sensing
instruments such as microwave radiometers and
global positioning system (GPS) receivers. The
following discussion addresses the principles
and operating characteristics of active and pas-
sive remote sensors in the context of their appli-
cability to problems of observing and modeling
for air quality forecasting and emergency
response.
5.1 Radar wind profilers
Radar wind profilers transmit short pulses of
radio-frequency energy, which are scattered by
clear-air atmospheric inhomogeneities and also
hydrometeors to produce a spectrum of Doppler
velocities. There are numerous types of radar
wind profilers available, and they can provide
coverage ranging from near the surface to the
lower troposphere or the lower stratosphere and
higher (depending on their radio frequency and
hardware configuration). Table 4 summarizes
general operating characteristics of the three
common classes of wind profiler according to
their nominal radio frequency: 50, 400 and
1000 MHz.
p (as height):
24 m
T:
0.6 C
Td:
3.3 C
WS:
3.1 m=s
WD:
18 to
5 (a)
u, v:
2 m=s
WS:
2 m=s
WD:
30
u, v:
2 ms1
WS:
2 ms1
WD:
30

1.5 C
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
Table 4. General characteristics of radar wind profilers
Parameters Frequency
1000 MHz
Altitude range (km) 0.1–7.0
Vertical resolution (m) 60–500
Normal averaging period (min) 15
Portability Good
RASS application Easy
(700–1500 m)
Manufacturers (No.) 6 2
Current uses – Mesoscale
– Air quality
– Airports
The most commonly used measurement prin-
ciple is Doppler beam swinging, which involves
alternating the radar beam direction and measur-
ing the attendant Doppler shift as a function of
range (height). The ambient vector velocity is
then retrieved from the radial velocities. Another
method, called spaced-antenna profiling, trans-
mits a single vertically-directed radar beam and
measures the phase relationships of the returned
signal at multiple, adjacent antenna locations to
retrieve the vector wind profile. Radar wind pro-
filers provide the benefits of continuous unat-
tended operation with high temporal resolution
(5–10 min for UHF systems). Height resolution
is 60–75 m with minimum heights about
150 m; maximum height depends on atmospheric
humidity and turbulence, and is typically 3–5 km
for commercial UHF profilers. Increased height
resolution is available with FM=CW systems
while recent research involving the use of several
discrete frequencies shows promise as well.
The boundary layer wind profiler (BLWP) is a
remote sensing Doppler radar that produces a
profile of the vertical and horizontal winds in
clear air three kilometers or more above ground
level. When a Radio Acoustic Sounding System
(RASS) is added to the BLWP, the profile
includes virtual temperature up to approximately
1.5 kilometers. RASS systems operate on the
principle that the speed of sound is directly pro-
portional to the temperature – more specifically
the virtual temperature. The vertical beam of a
radar profiler tracks acoustic waves emitted by
the RASS sources. The frequency of the acoustic
waves satisfies the Bragg Condition (i.e.,
67
450 MHz 50 MHz
0.3–18 1–21
150–500 300–2000
30 60
Marginal Poor
Marginal Marginal
(1500–3000 m) (5–8 km)
3
– Research – Research
– Mesoscale – Aerospace
– Synoptic – Forecasting
forecasting
a ¼ e=2 where a is the acoustic wavelength
and e is the radar wavelength). The frequency
of the acoustic signal is modulated to maximize
the received power at the radar and this allows
the Bragg Condition to be satisfied. Normal
Doppler processing (Atlas, 1990) determines the
Bragg frequency from which the acoustic veloc-
ity is derived. Further processing derives virtual
temperature from its known relationship to the
speed of sound. In all RASS systems the maxi-
mum range is limited by strong winds that advect
the acoustic wave fronts away from the radar
wavefront, by turbulence and temperature gradi-
ents that distort the acoustic waves, and by
attenuation of the acoustic signal. A typical range
for the 1000 MHz class of profilers is 700–
1500 m with the longer ranges achieved in high
humidity environments. Resolution and range for
RASS are the same as for the wind calculations;
see Table 4 and also Kaimal and Finnigan
(1994).
The profiler produces this data by transmitting
in three or five orthogonal pointing directions;
see Fig. 4 for a schematic of the scanning topol-
ogy. The wavelength is 32.8 cm for 915-MHz
BLWP systems and 23.2 cm for 1290-MHz
BLWP systems. After transmitting a signal, the
profiler receives the return signals that are
reflected by atmospheric turbulence. Then the
profiler computes the horizontal wind speed
and direction for the chosen number of heights
above the ground as well as the vertical velocity.
In this manner, the BLWP provides continuous
real-time atmospheric wind and temperature
data. Furthermore, the BLWP can operate
68
Fig. 4. Scanning topology of a beam-steering wind profiler
unattended and can be networked to other loca-
tions. The standard configuration of the BLWP is
transportable; increased mobility can be accom-
plished by mounting the BLWP on a trailer. Fig-
ure 5 is a block diagram of the basic components
of a BLWP.
The BLWP was first fielded operationally in
the early 1990’s. The primary application at the
time was in support of air quality monitoring and
transport of pollutants within and between air
quality management regions. Since then BLWPs
Fig. 5. Basic components of a boundary layer wind profiler
W. F. Dabberdt et al
have been employed in a number of other appli-
cations such as aviation, mesoscale observations,
and military operations. Government rules result-
ing from the 1990 Amendments to the Clean Air
Act specified the establishment of Photochemical
Assessment Monitoring Stations (PAMS) for
regions that were classified as serious, severe,
or extreme with regard to atmospheric ozone
concentrations; see 40 CFR Part 58 (1993). At
the time of the amendments, 22 such regions
were identified across the USA. An integral part
of the recommended PAMS configuration was an
upper-air monitoring capability. Although not
specifically identified at the time, the BLWP
was recognized as an ideal tool for meeting this
requirement. They are relatively low cost, con-
tinuously operating, unattended systems that
can supply the upper-air data needed to model
the ozone characteristics of the region. Other
options included RAOBs or long range sodar.
Most of the 22 regions chose the BLWP. Since
1990, other regions have reached non-attainment
of the ozone standards and many have opted for
the BLWP as part of the PAMS observing suite.
Wind profile data are collected at 15-min or 30-
min intervals and transmitted to a central site for
incorporation into the ozone forecasting process.
The data are also archived for use by model
developers in improving transport and concentra-
tion level methods.
Since their introduction as operational tools in
the early 1990’s, Innovations in BLWPs and
radar wind profilers in general have incorporated
many hardware and software innovations.
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
5.1.1 Innovations
Antennas: Antenna design now ranges from basic
Yagi configurations to dipole to micropatch
arrays. For the Doppler Beam Swinging (DBS)
method, the beam patterns are formed by either
orienting the antenna panels in a fixed direction
or phasing the beam electronically. A variation
on the beam swinging method is the spaced
antenna (SA) configuration where several clus-
ters of antenna elements form vertical beams
and employ correlation techniques to detect the
horizontal wind pattern. Figure 4 depicts the
DBS type antenna and Fig. 6 depicts a SA type
antenna.
Transmitters: Tube-type amplifiers are em-
ployed in some transmitters while solid state con-
figurations are increasingly more popular in
others. The combination of antenna aperture
and transmitted power are basic inputs to the
radar equation. For given atmospheric conditions,
both ultimately impact the return signal and the
ability to extract atmospheric information.
Receivers: The primary innovation for receiv-
ing technology centers on where in the raw data
stream the analog-to-digital signal conversion
takes place. Recent developments (Vaisala,
2002) in receiver hardware that allow perfor-
mance of this conversion at the Intermediate
Fig. 6. Schematic of a multiple-antenna wind profiler
(courtesy of NCAR)
69
Frequency (IF) element offer some advantages
for the user.
Signal Processing Software: The BLWP pro-
duces a data stream that must be converted to
atmospheric intelligence. Standard signal pro-
cessing (AMS, 2002) can involve six steps as
follows, summarized below:
(1) Coherent Integration. Takes the input time
series and averages them for several periods.
Wavelet pre-processing uses early rejection
of clutter to ensure the atmospheric signal
is detected. Another option does no coherent
averaging or uses Blackman-Harris (or other)
window, rather than boxcar average. Finally
a low-pass filter can be employed.
(2) Windowed FFT. Employs the fast Fourier
transfer (FFT) to convert from the time to
the frequency domain. An innovation is to
employ no windowing for long time series.
(3) Spectral Averaging and Signal Identification.
Reveals peaks in the returned signal, one of
which is the atmospheric wind. Selects the
atmospheric peak. Several innovations are
currently employed. Statistical averaging,
for example, the ICRA (Intermittent Clutter
Reduction Algorithm) uses statistical aver-
aging to reject cluttered data and select the
atmospheric signal. Time height continuity
establishes error bars based on previous data
sample and data above and below to flag sus-
pect data or eliminate obviously bad data.
Multiple peak selection employs various
logical methods to select the atmospheric
peak in the presence of two or more candi-
dates. The final innovation is Fuzzy Logic
(global image processing) algorithms that
use range as well as frequency during con-
tinuity checks. This method delays applying
any hard thresholds throughout the pro-
cessing steps. It recognizes ground clutter
characteristics and RFI and provides a con-
fidence quality value.
(4) Moments Calculation. Calculates the signal
power, spectral width and Doppler shift of
the atmospheric peak.
(5) Winds Calculation. Performs a consensus
average of several sets of moments cal-
culations. Calculates a wind from the
resulting average. Recent innovations include
Moments to Winds based on linear wind field
70 W. F. Dabberdt et al

by testing assumptions for confidence esti- be available to the operational community in

mates and use of time-height continuity. the near future.
(6) Range Imaging (RIM). The available range
Summary: Radar wind profilers have progressed
resolution of pulsed radar wind profilers is
beyond their original design through the hard-
normally limited by bandwidth. Range
ware and software improvements cited above.
Imaging (RIM) has recently been developed
Of particular note are the advances in signal pro-
(Chilson et al, 2003) to mitigate these limita-
cessing that have improved overall data quality
tions by using a technique of combining
and have allowed the radar profilers to be
signals from a small number of shifted
employed operationally with minimal human
frequencies to reconstruct the atmospheric
interaction. On the horizon are new techniques
structure in range within the radar volume.
that will greatly improve the range resolution
Signals from shifted frequencies can be
and quality of output data to the point where
added coherently at a specific range by intro-
improved modeling methods will be required to
ducing proper phase shifts to the signals.
take full advantage of these innovations.
Figure 7 depicts the effect of RIM processing
on a radar profiler signal. Many features in
the PBL that escape detection by standard
5.2 Sodar
wind profiler signal processing are readily
identified by the higher resolution available Sound detection and ranging (sodar) technology
with RIM processing. Such atmospheric fea- has been used to study the atmospheric boundary
tures as the height and thickness of the mixed layer since the mid-1970’s (Balser et al, 1976;
layer and entrainment zone, internal gravity Caughy et al, 1976; Asimakopoulos et al,
waves in stable stratified flows, and Kelvin- 1978). A sodar operates similar to the underwater
Helmholtz instabilities are important to air SONAR in that it emits a finite length acoustic
quality analysis and are resolvable with signal and monitors the echo. In the case of
RIM processing. RIM is presently transition- SONAR echoes can be returned from a thermo-
ing from research to operations and should cline, an object, a school of fish, etc. In contrast

Fig. 7. Enhanced (range-im-

aging) and conventional radar
reflectivity time-height cross-
sections
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
the sodar monitors the turbulence-induced echo
from the atmosphere. Initially only non-Doppler
versions of the sodar were available (Little, 1969;
Coulter, 1979; Russell and Uthe, 1978), and were
used to visualize boundary layer features such as
thermal plumes, inversions, wind shears, waves,
etc. (Neff, 1988); an example is presented in
Fig. 8. The vertical structures are called ‘‘thermal
plumes’’, which through buoyancy-induced
motions transfer heat from the Earth’s surface
to the upper part of the boundary layer. This pro-
cess efficiently mixes pollutants within the atmo-
spheric boundary layer. In contrast when the
sodar signal pattern reveals horizontal turbulent
structures, that type of atmosphere is indicative
of a stable atmosphere which inhibits vertical
mixing. These two atmospheric regimes are
extremely important in both air pollution and
emergency response applications and are well
detected by sodar.
When the atmospheric echo is also analyzed
for its frequency content (in addition to signal
amplitude), the relative motion toward and away
from the receiver antenna can be inferred from
the shift in this frequency with respect to the
transmitted frequency (i.e., the Doppler shift).
Doppler sodar systems were introduced to the
atmospheric community in the mid-1970s
(Balser et al, 1976; Caughey et al, 1976; Gaynor,
1977). Similar to the techniques employed in the
microwave wind profiler and Doppler lidar, the
radial motions are transformed into horizontal
and vertical wind components and then into a
horizontal wind speeds and directions. Since this
71
Fig. 8. Color-coded facsimile of
the atmospheric echo intensity
displayed as a function of height
and time. The vertically ori-
ented, triangular structures are
thermal plumes and are asso-
ciated with the transfer of heat
upward by buoyancy forces
initial introduction Doppler sodar systems have
demonstrated their ability to profile winds
below 1000 m (see Fig. 9), and provide an effec-
tive method to measure stack-height winds
(Finkelstein et al, 1986; Gaynor et al, 1994;
Kaimal et al, 1984; Crescenti, 1997).
A sodar is a relatively simple electro-acoustic
system that consists of: (1) acoustic antenna and
pre-amplifier(s); (2) signal processor(s); and (3)
audio power amplifier(s) as illustrated in Fig. 10.
The acoustic antenna is either an array of speak-
ers or a parabolic dish with a high-powered
speaker transducer mounted at the acoustic focal
point. Parabolic dish antennas were used exclu-
sively until the early 1990s. However, the suc-
cessful development and testing of steerable,
speaker array antennas (Balser and Ambler,
1985; Ito, 1998; Khanna et al, 1999) has resulted
in them becoming the dominant commercial and
research antenna design due to their compact
design and portability. Sodar signal processing
requires a balanced combination of analog signal
conditioning of the low-level atmospheric echo
signal and digital signal processing to cover the
dynamic range of the echo signal. Sodar signals
are processed for their frequency content(s) using
techniques based on the Fast Fourier Transform.
Some sodar systems use a dynamic combination
of acoustic frequencies (i.e., multiple frequency
system) to simultaneously produce low altitude
(>10 m) and high altitude (>1000 m) wind
measurements.
High-frequency sodar systems were first used
in the research community in the mid-1980s
72 W. F. Dabberdt et al
Fig. 10. Functional diagram of basic sodar functions. Some
of these functions (such as beam or antenna selection, ana-
log signal processing, acoustic pulse generation, beam
formation, etc.) may be performed in either software or
hardware
(Asimakopoulos et al, 1987). Because these
systems were physically smaller than the low-
frequency systems, they became know as
mini-sodar systems. The mini-sodar is a high-
frequency, low-altitude version of the conven-
tional sodar. It operates in the audio frequency
range of 4.0–6.0 kHz while the conventional
sodar operates at 1.0–2.5 kHz. Because of its
operating frequency and the increased absorp-
tion of acoustic energy at these high frequen-
cies, the mini sodar has an operational range of
250 meters. Comparisons with in situ measure-
ments from well-maintained meteorological
Fig. 9. Time-height cross sec-
tion of boundary layer winds
produced by a Doppler sodar
system
towers (Coppalle et al, 2002) have demon-
strated that mini sodar systems are more accu-
rate and have higher altitude resolution than
conventional sodar systems. Some mini-sodar
systems are able to measure from 10 to
200 m agl with 5-m height resolution. The
increased atmospheric absorption of sound at
mini-sodar frequencies may enable it in some
cases to be located in acoustically sensitive
sites such as on the top of buildings in cities,
etc. Another advantage of the mini sodar is that
it is able to operate in higher background noise
level (BNL) environments because the actual
BNL within the mini sodar operational band-
width is much lower at frequencies above
3.0 kHz when compared to the acoustic energy
below 3.0 kHz.
Finally, sodar systems complement microwave
wind profiler measurements because the upper
altitudes of the sodar wind measurements overlap
the lower altitudes of the microwave wind mea-
surements. One example of merging data from
the microwave wind profiler and sodar is pre-
sented in Fig. 11. In this figure, the high-resolu-
tion wind speed measurements indicate a
low-level jet at about 125 m. Above the jet the
sodar measurements merge with those from a co-
located radar wind profiler for a more complete
description of the vertical wind field in this stable
boundary layer. For both air pollution and
emergency response applications, the peak of
this low-level jet is both a barrier to the vertical
diffusion and a region of enhanced pollution
transport.
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response 73

Fig. 11. Composite vertical pro-

file of horizontal wind speed
consisting of 10 m anemometer
measurements, sodar measure-
ments from 15 to 200 m, and ra-
dar wind profiler measurements
from 125 to 600 m (and above)

5.3 Lidar atmospheric aerosols during a forest fire trans-

port event on the U.S. east coast as measured
A variety of lidar remote sensing techniques have
by a surface-based lidar operating at 532 nm
effectively been applied to air quality applica-
(green). Several processes are illustrated in the
tions in recent years. Fundamentally, lidar sys-
figure. The mixed layer depth grows gradually,
tems irradiate the atmosphere with pulses of
reaching the altitude of the smoke plume at
optical energy. As each pulse propagates through
approximately 1130 EDT. The wavelike structure
the atmosphere, a portion of its energy is scat-
at the top of the mixed layer results from con-
tered back to the system by atmospheric particles
vective plumes pushing up through the top of the
and molecules. The scattered energy is collected
stable layer. Beyond 1130 EDT, smoke entrains
and, depending on the type of lidar, can be ana-
into the mixed layer with significant smoke
lyzed to provide information on a number of
parameters important for air quality, including
aerosol structure, aerosol layering, mixing layer
height, water vapor and trace gas concentrations,
and wind and turbulence structure. Although
clouds and precipitation adversely affect optical
techniques, this limitation is not critical for many
air quality applications, since most significant
pollution events occur during stagnant, non-pre-
cipitating high-pressure situations.
The simplest lidar with application in air qual-
ity and emergency response is a backscatter lidar,
which measures a profile of backscattered energy
as a function of height. Although backscattered
energy is a complicated function of size distribu-
tion, shape, and refractive index of the particles
in the scattering volume, high backscatter regions
are typically associated with high turbidity and
decreased visibility. The type of information Fig. 12. Time-height cross section of 532-nm aerosol back-
available from a simple backscatter lidar is illus- scatter measured at Baltimore, Md., showing downward
trated in Fig. 12, which shows a time-height mixing of smoke transported by distant forest fires. (Cour-
cross-section of the energy backscattered from tesy of Markus Pahlow)
74 W. F. Dabberdt et al
reaching the surface at approximately 1230
EDT. At later times, smoke from the elevated
plume is dispersed throughout the mixing layer,
resulting in low visibility and a measurable
decrease in solar radiation at the surface. Unat-
tended backscatter lidars suitable for air quality
applications have now been demonstrated for
several years.
Although presentations like Fig. 12 provide
excellent conceptual pictures of atmospheric pro-
cesses and pollution structure, it is often useful to
obtain quantitative information on the physical
and optical properties of the particulates, includ-
ing aerosol optical depth, size, and number con-
centration. A simple aerosol backscatter lidar
cannot unambiguously measure optical depth
because backscatter and extinction cannot be
computed independently. However, high spectral
resolution lidars (Piironen and Eloranta, 1994)
apply filtering techniques to separate the
backscattered energy into aerosol-scattered and
molecule-scattered components. Then, with
knowledge of the temperature profile (which
can be related to the molecular-scattering inten-
sity) the optical depth can be computed directly.
Current efforts are aimed at developing the tech-
nology to enable unattended, continuous high-
resolution lidar operation, which promises to
significantly extend practical application of the
technique.
More complicated backscatter lidar techniques
can be employed to measure aerosol microphys-
ical properties. For example, one research lidar
(M€uller et al, 2000) employs six wavelengths
(355, 400, 532, 710, 800, 1064 nm) and 11
receiver channels to estimate effective radius,
volume, surface area, number concentrations
and mean complex refractive index of tropo-
spheric particles. In addition to detecting the sig-
nals backscattered at the emitted wavelengths,
the system also employs polarization discrimina-
tion for the 710 nm-backscattered channel and
detects the Raman-shifted wavelengths of mole-
cular scatter of nitrogen at 387 and 607 nm and
water vapor at 660 nm. Although lidars of this
complexity are still research instruments and
impractical for operational air quality observa-
tions, the capability to continuously monitor
profiles of important aerosol properties has
application in research campaigns aimed at
improving understanding of aerosol phenomena
and characterization of aerosol properties in
numerical models.
Lidars can also measure profiles of atmospheric
pollutant gas concentrations, most notably ozone,
through the application of differential absorption
lidar (DIAL) techniques. DIAL instruments trans-
mit two wavelengths characterized by different
absorption coefficients for the gas of interest to
compute gas concentrations based on the differen-
tial of the energy detected at the two wavelengths.
DIAL measurements of ozone from surface and
especially airborne platforms (Senff et al, 1999;
Banta et al, 1999) have been applied in air quality
research for several years. For example, Fig. 13
shows an ozone profile measured by a down-look-
ing airborne ozone lidar as the aircraft crossed the
coast of Galveston Bay near Houston, Texas dur-
ing a recent field experiment. The effects of sea
breeze-induced convergence to create a vertical
plume of high ozone are clearly illustrated.
Although DIAL ozone systems are generally still
operated in a research mode, several efforts are
currently underway to demonstrate the feasibility
of operational unattended, ground-based profiling
lidar for upper air input to air quality forecast
models (see http:==lidarb.dkrz.de=earlinet=
earlisymp=posters=Poster_AFO-KE.pdf). DIAL
techniques can also be used to measure water
vapor profiles (e.g., Wulfmeyer and Bosenberg,
1998), an important component for characterizing
the development of urban haze.
Fig. 13. Airborne differential lidar measurements at the
shoreline of Galveston Bay showing high ozone concentra-
tions associated with a sea breeze front. (Courtesy of
Christoph Senff)
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response 75

Raman lidar systems offer another lidar tech-

nique for characterizing water vapor profiles.
Raman lidar systems detect selected species by
monitoring the wavelength-shifted molecular
return produced by vibrational Raman scattering
from the chosen molecule or molecules. By tak-
ing the ratio of the signal at the water-vapor
wavelength to the signal at the nitrogen wave-
length, the water vapor mixing ratio can be com-
puted. Raman lidars can also be employed to
measure aerosol backscatter and extinction
profiles. Because the Raman-scattered signal is
weak, high-energy lasers, large receiver aper-
tures, and high quality filters are required for
daytime operation. Although usually applied as
research instruments, a Raman lidar system has
been operating continuously at the Atmospheric
Radiation Measurements Program Cloud and
Radiation Testbed (CART) site for several years
(Goldsmith et al, 1998). Information on the tem-
perature profile is present in the rotational Raman
Fig. 14. Plan-position-indicator (PPI) Doppler lidar scan
return, and a Raman lidar system in a research showing radial winds observed near sunrise from the center
application has demonstrated relative humidity of the Salt Lake basin. Outflows from canyons east of the
measurement capability by applying Raman tech- lidar are clearly shown. (Courtesy of Lisa Darby)
niques to estimate both the water vapor and tem-
perature profiles (Mattis et al, 2002). A combined
Raman and DIAL technique, in which the Raman can significantly affect pollution concentrations
scattered returns from oxygen and nitrogen are at different locations within the basin depending
analyzed to extract the differential absorption on their relationship to sources. In addition,
due to ozone, has been used in a research mode studies of the nocturnal boundary layer have
to calculate ozone profile concentrations (Mulik demonstrated the ability of Doppler lidar to char-
and Philbrick, 2000) during air pollution events. acterize the evolution of nocturnal low-level jets
Doppler wind lidars (see Grund et al, 2001) and thin turbulent layers, which affect transport
have also found extensive application in air qual- and mixing of pollutants on local scales. Lidar-
ity studies. Although less robust than radar wind measured winds in Fig. 15 show wave structure
profilers for measuring continuous profiles of and strong shear around a thin layer just 50 m
winds aloft, Doppler lidars can be scanned at above the surface.
very low angles to map the wind over an urban Initial results from measurements such as
area, or in a vertical plane to profile wind and these indicate that the strength of the shear at
turbulence structure in thin layers near the low elevations can potentially be used to parame-
ground. When directed horizontally, lidar scans terize turbulence and mixing in air quality mod-
can observe small-scale flows in areas of com- els (Banta et al, 2003).
plex terrain where local wind effects can be
important. Figure 14 shows a horizontal scan of
5.4 Meteorological radar
the wind component coming toward a ground-
based lidar located in the Salt Lake Basin during Meteorological Doppler radars are remote sen-
the fall 2000 Vertical Transport and Mixing sing systems that measure the intensity of back-
Experiment (VTMX; see Doran et al, 2002). scattered energy from and the radial velocity of
Flows into and out of various canyons to the east, hydrometeors, insects and refractive index fluc-
as well as the overall basin flow from the south- tuations (in clear air). Operational Doppler radars
east, can be clearly seen. Such localized flows typically transmit at one of three wavelengths:
76
Fig. 15. Doppler lidar vertical scan of low-level radial
winds measured at night showing wave-like structure atop
a shallow layer near the surface, with a low-level jet just
above. (Courtesy of Robert Banta)
3 cm (X band), 5 cm (C band) and 10 cm (S
band). Some research radars operate in the mm-
wavelength range (k band). The clear air capabil-
ities vary with wavelength. The 10 cm systems
can measure clear-air velocities out to a few tens
kilometers while 3 cm systems can measure clear
air returns to only 10–15 km. Although radar
sensing of chemical constituents is not possible,
the capability to resolve three-dimensional
winds, water vapor and precipitation processes
by Doppler radar can determine pollutant trans-
port, wet deposition, scavenging, and boundary
layer depth that are important in air quality and
emergency response applications.
The most extensive operational Doppler radar
network is the Next Generation Weather Radar
system (NEXRAD; see NAS, 1995); which com-
prises approximately 160 Weather Surveillance
Radar-1988 Doppler (WSR-88D) sites through-
out the United States and selected overseas loca-
tions. This S-band system is a joint effort of the
United States Departments of Commerce (DOC),
Defense (DOD), and Transportation (DOT). The
WSR-88D measures reflectivity, radial velocity
and spectral width, and utilizes several scanning
W. F. Dabberdt et al
strategies or volume coverage patterns (VCP) – a
series of 360-deg sweeps at selected elevation
angles. Four separate scan strategies are currently
used: short- and long-pulse clear air strategies; a
precipitation strategy; and a severe weather strat-
egy. Figure 16 shows NEXRAD coverage above
3 km agl for the contiguous United States. A lim-
itation of NEXRAD for dispersion applications is
its limited area of coverage in the lower tropo-
sphere. This so-called ‘‘cone of silence’’ is a
consequence of earth curvature, blockage by
obstacles, and the radar’s minimum elevation
angle of 0.5 deg. Networks of smaller but more
densely spaced radars are being considered to
complement NEXRAD and to overcome these
limitations (NAS, 2002).
Three-dimensional winds can be retrieved
from the overlapping radial velocities measured
by two or more Doppler radar systems (e.g.,
Armijo, 1969). However, due to the large separa-
tion among radars, the WSR-88D network
provides only very limited areas suitable for
dual-Doppler analysis. For most of the continen-
tal U.S., three-dimensional wind fields must be
retrieved from single-Doppler radar wind-retriev-
al techniques (discussed later on). For special
studies of limited duration, various research
Doppler radars are available; these include trans-
portable 10 cm radars, airborne 3 cm radars
(Hildebrand et al, 1996; Wakimoto et al, 1996)
and mobile, truck-mounted 3 cm radars called
Doppler on Wheels (Wurman et al, 1997;
Wurman and Gill, 2000; Wurman, 2002). Radars
like these can provide high-resolution measure-
ments to supplement the fixed national radar net-
work and fill in the ‘‘cone of silence’’. These
mobile radar systems can either form their own
multiple Doppler radar network or sometimes
pair with the operational radars to collect multi-
ple Doppler radar data.
Other methods have also been developed to
retrieve winds from single Doppler radars. In
the TREC technique (tracking reflectivity echoes
by correlation), the assumption is made that the
radar targets are advected by the horizontal
winds. TREC (Rinehart and Garvey, 1978; Tuttle
and Foote, 1990) computes the wind direction
and speed at grid points by correlating distinct
reflectivity patterns of a given domain on two
consecutive radar volume scans. TREC does
not require simultaneously measured Doppler
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
Fig. 16. Composite WSR-88D coverage at 3 km above site level for the contiguous United States and the locations of the
NWS and DoD radar sites. Source: NAS (1995)
velocity information. When the wind field varies
linearly in space, the Velocity Azimuth Display
(VAD; see Browning and Wexler, 1968) tech-
nique can be applied to estimate the mean
divergence, wind direction and speed, and defor-
mation within an analysis circle of radius R sur-
rounding the radar. Mean vertical velocities can
be estimated by integrating the anelastic continu-
ity equation from the mean divergence field.
Ambiguity in the mean divergence arises when
there is vertical motion of radar targets, such as
particle fall speed in precipitation and organized
vertical air motion within the analysis domain.
Nevertheless, the extended VAD technique
(Srivastava et al, 1986; Matejka and Srivastava,
1991) can be used to alleviate this ambiguity and
obtain reasonable vertical velocities in stratiform
precipitation regions. The VAD method is partic-
ularly useful in estimating wind profiles in the
clear-air boundary layer and within stratiform
precipitation.
77
Horizontal winds can also be retrieved from
single-Doppler velocity retrieval (SDVR) tech-
niques. SDVR methods vary in complexity from
simple conservation principles (e.g., radar
reflectivity and=or Doppler velocity as passive
tracers) to the use of full dynamic constraints
and multiple time-steps of radar data to retrieve
the unobserved cross-beam horizontal and ver-
tical wind components. Reasonable horizontal
winds in the boundary layer have been retrieved
using simple adjoint techniques (Qiu and Xu,
1992; Xu and Qiu, 1994; Xu et al, 1994a; Xu
et al, 1994b; Gao et al, 2001) and least-squares
methods (Gal-Chen and Zhang, 1993; Xu et al,
1995; Zhang and Gal-Chen, 1996; Lazarus et al,
1999). The more elaborate four-dimensional
variational adjoint technique employs a numer-
ical model to retrieve the three-dimensional wind
field (Sun et al, 1991; Sun and Crook, 1994).
Extensions of this method can also retrieve
thermodynamic and microphysical information
78 W. F. Dabberdt et al

Fig. 17a. S-Pol radar reflectivity field at 2245 UTC on 22 May 2002 with arrows showing two well-defined boundaries: a
dryline and an unidentified boundary; (b) Corresponding S-Pol refractivity retrieval at 2254 UTC on 22 May 2002. Note the
strong gradients at the locations of the arrows indicative of boundary features. (from Weckwerth et al, 2003)

on thunderstorms (e.g., Sun and Crook, 1997,
1998 and 2000; Wu et al, 2000). Some success
has been achieved by ingesting SDVR winds
into a knowledge-based expert system (e.g.,
Roberts et al, 1999) and initializing numerical
models for short-term forecasts of thunderstorm
evolution (Gao et al, 1998; Warner et al, 2000).
In addition to measuring winds, ground-based
Doppler radar can also derive the refractive index
(a function of atmospheric pressure, temperature
and moisture) in the boundary layer from sur-
rounding ground target returns. For a fixed atmo-
spheric pressure in the boundary layer (e.g.,
1000 mb) and at warm temperatures (e.g.,
>10  C), the refractive index is more sensitive
to changes in moisture than temperature (Fabry
et al, 1997). Figure 17 illustrates an example of
the radar reflectivity and the corresponding sharp
moisture (refractivity) gradient along an Okla-
homa dry line observed from the NCAR SPOL
10 cm radar during the recent IHOP_2002
experiment (Weckwerth et al, 2003). The ability
to identify regions of high moisture content and
wind convergence can pinpoint potential hot
spots for convection initiation, which can result
in venting pollutants out of the boundary layer.
Multi-parameter radars transmit and measure
returned signals from both horizontally- and ver-
tically-polarized beams enabling them to differ-
entiate precipitation type (e.g., rain, snow, hail)
and shapes (e.g., Herzegh and Jameson, 1992;
Jameson, 1983; Ryzhkov and Zrnic, 1998a;
Wakimoto and Bringi, 1988; Zrnic et al, 2001).
In addition to the traditional reflectivity and
Doppler velocity, various derived polarimetric
parameters such as differential reflectivity
(ZDR), linear depolarization ratio (LDR), specific
differential propagation phase (KDP), and corre-
lation coefficient (HV) have been used in con-
junction with a fuzzy logic approach to delineate
particle types in both clear air and precipitation
region (Vivekanandan et al, 1999b); see Fig. 18.
This new approach (termed radar echo classifier)
can identify ground clutter, anomalous propaga-
tion, birds and insects, and hence provide better
estimates of precipitation rates than from only
the true meteorological returns (i.e., reflectivity).
There is a clear advantage of using KDP to esti-
mate rainfall over the traditional Z-R (reflec-
tivity-rainfall) relationship. First, attenuation
does not affect polarimetric parameters the same
way as the reflectivity factor, especially in heavy
precipitation regions. Second, KDP is not affected
by anomalous propagation (Ryzhkov and Zrnic,
1998b). Hence, improved rainfall estimates can
be achieved especially in high rain rate situation
where radar reflectivity factor exceeds 40 dBZ
(e.g., Brandes et al, 2001; Zrnic and Ryzhkov,
1996; Vivekanandan et al, 1999a). The National
Weather Service plans to upgrade its WSR-88D
weather radars to include this capability begin-
ning around 2005.
In summary, boundary layer winds, moisture,
microphysical, and thermodynamic parameters
can be measured, derived or retrieved from a
variety of radar measurements. A direct applica-
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
tion for emergency response would involve ini-
tialization of a numerical model or nowcasting
(<2 hours) future meteorological conditions,
such as transport and wet deposition.
5.5 Passive microwave radiometers and GPS
Ground-based passive microwave radiometers of
various types are able to obtain vertical profiles
of temperature, water vapor, cloud liquid water
and winds with varying degrees of accuracy and
vertical resolution. These all-weather instru-
ments are currently beginning to transition from
research devices into quasi-operational instru-
ments that can provide useful boundary layer
measurements important to real-time dispersion
and air quality modeling. Their general charac-
teristics include the following combinations: sin-
gle or multiple frequency, and vertically pointing
or scanning. Among the many useful reviews
are those by Westwater (1993) and Solheim et al
(1998).
79
Fig. 18. RHI scans of (a) ZHH, (b)
ZDR, and (c) the corresponding
particle classification results. The
radar measurements were col-
lected by the NCAR S-Pol Radar
during the CASES-97 field pro-
gram (from Vivekanandan et al,
1998)
Single-frequency ground-based microwave
scanning radiometers (MWSR) are capable of
measuring the temperature profile in the lower
troposphere with accuracy and resolution that
are useful for air quality and dispersion applica-
tions. In the past decade, single-channel MWSRs
have been developed in Russia (Troitsky et al,
1993) and the U.S. (Westwater, 1993; Solheim
et al, 1998). As described by Kadygrov and Pick
(1998), the Russian instrument measures the
brightness temperature of the atmosphere at
about 60 GHz, which is in the molecular oxygen
absorption band. Using a movable mirror, the
radiometer measures brightness temperatures at
eleven elevation angles (0 to 90 deg) with a beam-
width of 6 deg that results in a temperature sensi-
tivity of 0.04 K for a 1-sec integration; the dwell
time is 10 sec for each elevation angle. An inver-
sion algorithm derives the temperature profile
from the set of brightness temperatures and an
independent in situ near-surface temperature
measurement. Temperature profiles are retrieved
80
Fig. 19. Temperature weighting functions at 51.25 and 58.8 GHz as a function of height and elevation angle
(Westwater et al, 2000)
up to 300–600 m with 5-min temporal and 50-m
height resolution and have an estimated tem-
perature accuracy of 0.5 K (Kadygrov and Pick,
1998)4 . During the 1999 Mesoscale Alpine
Experiment (MAP), Kadygrov et al (2001) com-
pared radiometer profiles of temperature with 52
nearby radiosonde observations in a mountain-
valley location near Claro, Switzerland. They
report agreement between the two systems was
‘‘always better than 1 K.’’
The performance of the U.S. single-channel
MWSR is described from results obtained in
Alaska, the tropical western Pacific Ocean and
Oklahoma. This device is also centered at
60 HHz, but obtains data at 0.9 deg elevation
increments and time-variable scan rates. Using
a priori climatological information, Cimini et al
(2002) compared retrieved temperature profiles
with simultaneous, co-located RAOB soundings.
They found for the tropical site and 10-min scans
that the standard deviation of the MWSR-RAOB
difference was 0.3 K up to 500 m, while the rms
difference is 0.3 K up to 450 m; bias was
0.17 K up to 500 m. In another study,
Westwater et al (1999) compared radiometric
temperature retrievals with RAOB temperature
profiles up to a height of 800 m in September
1996 at a site in north-central Oklahoma; agree-
ment was better than 1 K.
Westwater et al (2000) describe a multi-chan-
nel ground-based MWSR for temperature profil-
ing; this scanning system measures brightness
temperatures at seven frequencies between 51
4 5
This radiometer is available as an commercial off-the-shelf
(COTS) instrument.
W. F. Dabberdt et al
and 59 GHz. In all these MWSRs, the sensitivity
of the brightness temperature to ambient tem-
perature, pressure, water vapor and cloud liquid
is expressed in terms of weighting functions that
vary with frequency (wavelength) and height.
Weighting functions are insensitive to water
vapor and liquid in the 51–59 GHz band of the
multi-frequency MWSR5 , while other bands are
sensitive and are used to profile these variables.
Figure 19 illustrates temperature weighting func-
tions at two frequencies as a function of elevation
angle and height. The accuracy of the retrieved
temperature profiles is a function of instrument
design (beamwidth and accuracy of the bright-
ness temperature measurement) as well as the
characteristics of the atmospheric profile itself
(intensity and height of inversions). Using 5000
RAOBs from a 5-year period, Westwater et al
(2000) estimated retrieved temperature accura-
cies of 0.6–1.0 K in the lowest 300 m, increasing
to about 0.8–1.2 K at 3 km; the accuracy range
corresponds to assumed instrument noise levels
of 0.1 K and 0.5 K as seen in Fig. 20. Height
resolution is difficult to estimate as it varies with
beamwidth and the availability of a priori knowl-
edge of the climatology of the temperature pro-
file. Using climatological profile information, the
height resolution varies nearly linearly with
height up to about 1.5 km (slope  0.7) and then
decreases (poorer resolution) up to 3 km.
Recent developments in ground-based passive
microwave remote sensing seek to derive vertical
profiles of winds and turbulence in the lower
These and subsequent instrument characteristics pertain to a
COTS multi-frequency MWSR.
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
Fig. 20. Estimated temperature-retrieval accuracy for a
seven-channel MWSR (Westwater et al, 2000)
PBL. In Kadygrov et al (2003), the measurement
system consists of two 60-GHz instruments that
make simultaneous measurements at a common
elevation angle and in the same vertical plane of
the mean wind. Inhomogeneities detected by the
upwind-pointing instrument are subsequently
detected at a delayed phase by the second, down-
wind-pointing instrument. Assumptions that are
made in the wind retrieval include that of a plane-
stratified atmosphere and ‘‘frozen turbulence.’’ A
three-month evaluation of retrieved winds against
in situ tower measurements indicated that re-
presentative wind data could be retrieved over
30–60-min averaging periods with accuracies of
1–2 ms1 and 10–20 deg; height resolution is
about 50 m and the maximum vertical range is
about 250 m. Although not yet used operationally,
the method offers promise as a possible low-level
complement to radar wind profilers and also as a
low-resolution alternative to sodar.
Humidity in the form of precipitable water
vapor (PWV) and integrated cloud liquid water
(ICL) can both be measured by ground-
based dual-frequency microwave radiometers.
Westwater (1993) reports that PWV can be
measured to an accuracy of 1.0–1.5 mm over
integration periods from 30 sec to 2 min during
non-precipitating conditions. ICL can be mea-
sured to accuracies of 10–20%. Water vapor
can also be measured with dual-frequency Glob-
al Positioning System (GPS) receivers to about
the same accuracy as microwave radiometers;
the integration period is longer (about 30 min)
but the measurements can be made during pre-
81
cipitating conditions. The GPS receivers mea-
sure the wet delay in the GPS signals from
four to eight satellites in order to retrieve
PWV. Recent research has demonstrated prom-
ise to retrieve water vapor profiles by inverting
PWV from individual slant paths (e.g., Hira-
hara, 2000; Ware et al, 2000) using a tomo-
graphic-like approach.
5.6 Remote sensing summary
Operational radio-, acoustic- and optical-fre-
quency profilers provide critical atmospheric
measurements needed to support dispersion and
deposition modeling for application to traditional
air quality needs as well as emergency response
requirements. Each can provide vertical profiles
of wind speed, wind direction and turbulence
(derived from spectral width data), and they also
are able to estimate the depth of the mixed
layer(s). A comprehensive intercomparison study
by Seibert et al (2000) showed positive results
at estimating mixing height from radar wind
profiler, sodar, and lidar data against in situ
sounding data; several different analysis algo-
rithms were evaluated. More recent, encouraging
work by Bianco and Wilczak (2002) has been
directed at the simultaneous use of data from
multiple profilers using a fuzzy logic analysis
scheme.
Research lidar systems offer capabilities
beyond those currently available from com-
mercial suppliers, although they tend to be more
expensive and require significant human exper-
tise to operate. However, both limitations could
be minimized or eliminated in the presence of
significant demand for operational systems.
Research lidars are being used to measure atmos-
pheric motions, density, and constituents.
Profiling temperature in the boundary layer
and through the troposphere is also very im-
portant, especially when turbulence profiles
are unavailable. Remote sensing techniques for
obtaining high-resolution, time-continuous tem-
perature profiles are less well developed than
those for winds and mixing height. Radiosondes
are still an important source of profile data for
temperature, but have the disadvantage of being
instantaneous measurements that are only avail-
able infrequently (operational RAOBs are avail-
able every 12 hours). Radar wind profilers can
82 W. F. Dabberdt et al

measure the vertical profile of virtual tempera-
ture when configured to operate as a radio
acoustic sounding system or RASS. As with
sodar, noise is an environmental nuisance that
limits RASS deployment in populated areas.
Passive single- and multiple-frequency, micro-
wave radiometers have been in research use
as a means to retrieve temperature profiles over
deep layers of the atmosphere. Their height
resolution and accuracy are adequate for many
applications in the lower troposphere. Microwave
radiometers are able to measure integrated water
vapor, water vapor profiles and integrated cloud
liquid water, while GPS receivers can measure
integrated water vapor (with recent research
focused on obtaining water vapor profiles).
6. Rapid-response measurements
When responding to airborne contaminants from
industrial accidents or terrorist attacks, the time,
location and nature of the ‘‘source’’ term are not
known in advance and may not be known with
great specificity in the minutes and hours after
the incident. This poses special meteorological
measurement challenges. As a consequence, fixed
meteorological observing systems that char-
acterize dispersion in numerical models may
need to be supplemented with rapid-response
deployable meteorological observing facilities.
Virtually all of the profiling and sounding
systems described in this review are highly
transportable, and some are portable (e.g., UAVs).
The difficulties surround determining where to
make supplemental measurements, and having
the appropriate measurement systems available
in an advanced state of readiness. These issues
have been addressed in a recent study undertaken
by the National Research Council (NRC, 2003).
7. Conclusions
Providing meteorological observations to support
dispersion modeling for air quality and emer-
gency response involves broad challenges: deter-
mining what measurements are essential and=or
desirable; designing observing systems that are
responsive to the needs of data assimilation and
simulation models; taking maximum advantage
of synergies with other day-to-day applications
(e.g., air pollution, mesoscale weather, hydrol-
ogy, aviation) that require similar meteorolo-
gical measurements; and developing portable
and transportable rapid-response meteorological
(and chemical) observing systems that comple-
ment and extend the capabilities of permanent
multi-purpose three-dimensional mesoscale net-
works. The recent advances in meteorological
instrumentation that are discussed in this paper
provide new and enhanced opportunities to estab-
lish observing systems that can effectively meet
the needs of the air quality and emergency
response communities. They also can serve the
needs of the operational weather and climate
communities thus offering efficiencies of scope
and cost.

Appendix A.1

U.S. Federal meteorological sensor standards (FCM-H1-1995)

Parameter Units of measure Range Accuracy Resolution

Wind direction deg ( ) 1 to 360
5 if speed 5 knots 10

Wind speed Knots 2 to 90 knots
1 knot  10 knots 1 knot
(1 knot ¼ 0.5144 ms1 )
10% > 10 knots
Temperature deg Celsius ( C) 62 to 50  C
1.1  C 0.1  C
50 to þ50  C
0.6  C 0.1  C
þ50 to þ54  C
1.1  C 0.1  C
Dew point temperature deg Celsius ( C) 34 to 24  C
2.2  C 0.1  C
24 to 01  C
1.7  C 0.1  C
01 to þ30  C
1.1  C 0.1  C
Pressure inches of mercury 4 in
0.02 in 0.005 in
(1 in Hg=33.8639 hPa)
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response 83

Appendix A.2

U.S. EPA recommended in situ measurement system performance characteristics in support of dispersion modeling applications
(EPA, 2000)

Variable Accuracy Resolution Starting speed Time=Distance constant:

1 1 1
Wind speed
0.2 ms 0.1 ms Horizontal: 0.5 ms 5m
þ5% of observed Vertical: 0.25 ms1 5m
Wind direction
5degrees 1.0 deg 0.5 m=s @ 10deg 5 m; Damping Ratio: 0.4–0.7
Damping Ratio: 0.4–0.7
Ambient temperature
0.5C 0.1 C 1 min
Vertical temperature difference
0.1 C 0.02 C 1 min
Dew point temperature
1.5 C 0.1 C 30 min
Precipitation
10% of observed 0.3 mm
or
0.5 mm
Pressure
3 mb (3 hPa) 0.5 hPa
Solar radiation
5% of observed 10 W=m2 5s Range: 285–2800 nm

Appendix A.3

Minimum system accuracy and resolution requirements for nuclear power dispersion applications (source: American National
Standard ANSI=ANS-3.11.2000)

Measurement1 Recommended units2 Accuracy (
)1 Recommended resolution2

Wind speed meters per second 0.1 0.1

 2.2 0.22 0.1
> 2.2 5% of observed 0.1
Standard deviation of wind speed:

u (horizontal) meters per second n=a 0.01

w (vertical) meters per second n=a 0.01
Wind direction
Horizontal degrees azimuth 5 1.0
Vertical degrees elevation 5 0.1
Standard deviation of horizontal wind direction (
, or
a)degrees azimuth n=a 0.1
Standard deviation of vertical wind direction (
, or
e) degrees elevation n=a 0.1
Air temperature degrees Celsius 0.5 0.1
Vertical air temperature difference (
T) degrees Celsius 0.1 0.01
Dew point temperature degrees Celsius 1.5 0.1
Relative humidity Percent 4 0.1
Precipitation Millimeters 10% of volume30.25
Solar=Terrestrial radiation watts per square meter
 100 5 1
> 100 5% of observed 1
Soil temperature degrees Celsius 1 0.5
Soil moisture Percent 10% of actual 1
Time Minutes 5 1
1
Accuracy should be based on manufacturer recommendations for measurements that are not listed
2
Recommended resolutions are based on recommended units. Other measurement units (e.g., miles per hour, degrees
Fahrenheit, inches, hours) may be used to be consistent with monitoring program objectives
3
Accuracy for volume equivalent to 2.54 mm precipitation and rate < 50 mm per hour
84 W. F. Dabberdt et al

Appendix A.4

Accuracy requirements (Expressed as standard error) for upper-air measurements for synoptic meteorology

Variable Range Accuracy requirement

Pressure Surface to 5 hPa
1 hPa

Temperature Surface to 100 hPa
0.5 K
100 to 5 hPa
1 K
Relative humidity Troposphere
5% (RH)
Wind direction Surface to 100 hPa
5 , for wind speed <15 m=s

2.5 for wind speed >15 m=s
100 to 5 hPa
5
Wind speed Surface to 100 hPa
1 m=s
100 to 5 hPa
2 m=s
Geopotential height of significant levels Surface to 100 hPa
1% near the surface decreasing to
0.5% at 100 hPa
Source: World Meteorological Organization (1996)

Appendix A.5

AMDAR sounding performance specifications

Variable Accuracy Comments

Pressure 4 hPa
Temperature 0.5  C Benjamin et al (1999)
0.4  C  3  C in presence of probe wetting (Painting, 2003)2
Horizontal Winds1
Speed 2–3 ms1 Painting (2003)2
1.8 ms1 Benjamin et al (1999)
Direction 10–20 deg Painting (2003)2
Water vapor mixing ratio (projected)  5% Fleming et al (2002)
1
Greater during aircraft maneuvering
2
From Moninger et al (2003)

References Balser M, McNary CA, Nagy AE, Loveland R, Dickson D

(1976) Remote wind sensing by acoustic radar. J Appl
40 CFR Part 58, Ambient Air Quality Surveillance; Final
Meteor 15: 50–58
Rule, Federal Register, Vol. 58, No. 28, 12 February 1993
Banta RM, Pichugina YL, Newsom RK (2003) Relationship
American Nuclear Society Standards Committee, Working
between low-level jet properties and turbulence kinetic
Group ANS-3.11 (2000) American national standard for
energy in the nocturnal stable boundary layer. J Atmos Sci
determining meteorological information at nuclear facil-
(in press)
ities, Report ANSI=ANS-3.11-2000, LaGrange Park, IL:
Banta RM, Senff CF, White AB, Trainer M, McNider RT,
American Nuclear Society, 28pp
Valente RJ, Mayeor SD, Alvarez RJ, Hardesty RM,
AMS (2002) AMS short course on the fundamentals of
Parrish D, Fehsenfeld FC (1999) Daytime buildup and
boundary layer wind and temperature profiling using radar
nighttime transport of urban ozone in the boundary
and acoustic techniques. Long Beach, CA
layer during a stagnation episode. J Geophys Res 103:
Armijo L (1969) A theory for the determination of wind and
22,519–22,544
precipitation velocities with Doppler radars. J Atmos Sci
Barbato JP (1978) Areal parameters of the sea breeze and its
26: 570–573
vertical structure in the Boston Basin. Bull Amer Meteor
Asimakopoulos DN, Cole RS, Crease BA, Caughey SJ
Soc 59(11): 1420–1431
(1978) A comparison of acoustic Doppler vertical velocity
Benjamin SG, Schwartz BE, Cole RE (1999) Accuracy of
power spectra with direct measurements. Atmos Environ
ACARS wind and temperature observations determined
12: 1951–1956
by collocation. Wea Forecast 14: 1032–1038
Atlas D (1990) Radar in meteorology. Boston: AMS, pp 529
Bianco L, Wilczak JM (2002) Convective Boundary Layer
Balser M, Ambler F (1985) Phased array acoustic antenna.
Depth: Improved measurement by Doppler radar wind
U.S. Patent No. 4,558,594
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
profiler using fuzzy logic methods. J Atmos Oceanic
Technol 19(11): 1745–1758
Brandes EA, Ryzhkov AV, Zrnic DS (2001) An evaluation of
radar rainfall estimates from specific differential phase.
J Atmos Oceanic Technol 18: 363–375
Brock FV, Richardson SJ (2001) Meteorological measure-
ment systems. New York: Oxford University Press, 290 pp
Browning KA, Wexler R (1968) The determination of
kinematic properties of a wind field using Doppler radar.
J Appl Meteor 7: 105–113
Caughey SJ, Crease BA, Asmakopoulos DN, Cole RS (1976)
A comparison of acoustic Doppler vertical velocities with
direct measurements in the atmospheric boundary layer.
Nature 262: 274–276
Chilson PB, Yu TY, Strauch RG, Muschinski A, Palmer RD
(2003) Implementation and validation of range imaging
on a UHF radar wind profiler. J Atmos Oceanic Technol
20: 987–996
Ching JKS, Clarke JF, Irwin JS, Godowitch JM (1981)
Review of EPA mixed layer diffusion program and assess-
ment of future needs. Proc. Workshop on the Parameter-
ization of Mixed Layer Diffusion. Las Cruces, N. M., U.S.
Army Research Office, RTP, NC
Cimini D, Westwater ER, Leuski VY (2002) Measurements
of atmospheric boundary layer temperature profiles
by microwave scanning radiometer. Proc. 1st COST
720 Workshop, l’Aquila, Italy, 19–21 June 2002
(www.cost720.rl.ac.uk=workshop1.htm)
Cleugh HA, Grimmond CSB (2001) Modeling regional scale
surface energy exchanges and CBL growth in a hetero-
geneous, urban-rural landscape. Bound Layer Meteor 98:
1–31
Coppalle A, Talbaut M, Corbin F (2002) Determination of
wind speed profile parameters in the surface layer using a
mini-sodar. Proc. 8th Int. Conf. on Harmonisation within
Atmospheric Dispersion Modelling for Regulatory Pur-
poses, Sofia, Bulgaria
Coulson KE (1975) Solar and terrestrial radiation: Methods
and measurements. New York: Academic Press, 322pp
Coulter RL (1979) A comparison of three methods for
measuring mixing height. J Appl Meteor 18: 1495–1499
Crescenti GH (1997) A look back on two decades of Doppler
sodar comparison studies. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 78(4):
651–673
Dabberdt WF, Cole H, Paukkunen A, Horhammer J,
Antikainen V, Shellhorn R (2002) Radiosondes. In: Ency-
clopedia of atmospheric sciences, vol. 6 (Holton JR,
Pyle J, Curry JA, eds). Elsevier Science: Academic Press,
pp 1900–1913
Dabberdt WF, Carroll MA with Baumgardner D, Carmichael
G, Cohen R, Dye T, Ellis J, Grell G, Grimmond S, Hanna
S, Irwin J, Lamb B, Madronich S, McQueen J, Meagher J,
Odman T, Pleim J, Schmid HP, Westphal D (2003)
Meteorological research needs for improved air quality
forecasting: report of the 11th prospectus development
team of the U.S. weather research program. Bull Amer
Meteor Soc (submitted July 2003)
DeFelice TP (1998) An introduction to meteorological
instrumentation and measurement. Upper Saddle River,
NJ: Prentice Hall, 229 pp
85
Dobson F, Hasse L, Davis R (1980) Air-sea interaction:
instruments and methods. New York: Plenum Press, 801pp
Doran JC, Fast JD, Horel J (2002) The VTMX 2000 cam-
paign. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 83: 537–551
Fabry F, Frush C, Zawadzki I, Kilambi A (1997) On the
extraction of near-surface index of refraction using radar
phase measurements from ground targets. J Atmos
Oceanic Technol 14: 978–987
Federal Meteorological Handbook Number 1 (1995) Surface
weather observations and reports, Report FCM-H1-1995,
Office of the Federal Coordinator for Meteorological
Services and Supporting Research, NOAA, Washington,
DC
Finkelstein PL, Kaimal JC, Gaynor JE, Graves ME,
Lockhart TJ (1986a) Comparison of wind monitoring
systems. Part II. Doppler sodars. J Atmos Oceanic Technol
3: 594–604
Fleming RJ (2000) Water vapor measurements from com-
mercial aircraft: Progress and plans. Preprints, 4th Symp.
on Integrated Observing Systems, Long Beach, CA.
Amer Meteor Soc, 30–33
Fleming RJ, Gallant DR, Feltz W, Meitı́n JG, Moninger WR,
Williams SF, Baker RT (2002) Water vapor profiles from
commercial aircraft. UCAR Technical Report, NOAA
Award No. NA17GP1376, University Corporation for
Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO, 37pp (January 9,
2002)
Foken T, Oncley S (1995) Results of the workshop on
‘‘Instrumental and methodical problems of land sur-
face flux measurements’’. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 76:
1191–1193
Fraden J (1996) Handbook of modern sensors: Physics,
designs and applications, 2nd ed. New York: Springer,
556pp
Fristchen LJ, Gay LW (1979) Environmental instrumenta-
tion. New York: Springer, 216pp
Gal-Chen T, Zhang J (1993) On the optimal use of reflectiv-
ities and single-Doppler radar velocities to deduce 3-D
motions. Preprints, 26th Int. Conf. on Radar Meteorology,
Norman, OK. Amer Meteor Soc, pp 414–416
Gao J, Xue M, Wang Z, Droegemeier KK (1998) The initial
condition and explicit prediction of convection using
ARPS adjoint and other retrieval methods with WSR-
88D data. Preprints, 12th Conf. on Numerical Wea-
ther Prediction, Phoenix, AZ. Amer Meteor Soc,
pp 176–178
Gao J, Xue M, Xu Q, Droegemeier KK (2001) Three-
dimensional simple adjoint velocity retrieval from
single-Doppler radar. J Atmos Oceanic Technol 18:
26–38
Gaynor JE (1977) Acoustic Doppler measurements of atmo-
spheric boundary layer velocity structure functions and
energy dissipation rates. J Appl Meteor 16: 148–155
Gaynor JE (1994) Accuracy of sodar wind variance mea-
surements. Int J Remote Sens 15: 313–324
Glickman TS, (Man. ED) (2000) Glossary of meteorology,
2nd ed. Boston, MA: Amer Meteor Soc, 855pp
Goldsmith JEM, Blair FH, Bisson SE, Turner DD (1998)
Turn-key Raman lidar for profiling atmospheric water
vapor, clouds, and aerosols. Appl Optics 37: 4979–4990
86 W. F. Dabberdt et al
Grund CJ, Banta RM, George JL, Howell JN, Post MJ,
Richter RA, Weickmann AM (2001) High resolution
Doppler lidar for boundary layer and cloud research.
J Atmos Oceanic Technol 18: 376–393
Gryning SE, Batchvarova E (2001) Mixing heights in urban
areas: will ‘‘rural’’ parameterizations work? COST 715:
Workshop on Urban Boundary Layer Parameterizations.
Zurich, Switzerland, May 2001 (Rotach MW, Fisher B,
Pieringer M, eds), 99–109
Hanna SR, Chang JC (1992) Boundary layer parameteriza-
tion for applied dispersion modeling over urban areas.
Bound Layer Meteor 58: 229–259
Herzegh PH, Jameson AR (1992) Observing precipitation
through dual-polarization radar measurements. Bull Amer
Meteor Soc 73: 1365–1374
Hildebrand PH, Lee W-C, Walther CA, Frush C, Randall M,
Loew E, Neitzel R, Parsons R, Testud J, Baudin F,
LeCornec A (1996) The ELDORA=ASTRAIA air-
borne Doppler weather radar design and observations
from TOGA COARE. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 77:
213–232
Hirahara K (2000) Local GPS tropospheric tomography.
Earth Planets Space 52: 935–939
Holland GJ, Webster PJ, Curry JA, Tyrell G, Gauntlett D, Brett
G, Becker J, Hoag R, Vaglienti W (2001) The aerosonde
robotic aircraft: A new paradigm for environmental obser-
vations. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 82(5): 889–901
Hughes P, Gedzelman D (1995) The new meteorology.
Weatherwise 48: 26–36
Ito Y (1998) Design and performance of an acoustic antenna
for a phased array Doppler sodar. J Royal Meteor Soc
5(2): 149–156
Jameson AR (1983) Microphysical interpretation of multi-
parameter radar measurements in rain. Part I: Interpreta-
tion of polarization measurements and estimation of
raindrop shapes. J Atmos Sci 40: 1792–1802
Kadygrov E, Kadygrov V, Miller E, Weber H, Rotach MW
(2001) The thermal structure of the atmospheric boundary
layer in an Alpine valley: Results of continuous remote
sensing measurements and comparison with radiosonde
data. In: IRS 2000: Current Problems in Atmospheric
Radiation (Smith WL, Timofeyev YuM, eds), Hampton,
VA: A. Deepak Publishing, pp 1097–1101 (see also
www.iac.ethz.ch=en=research=map_riviera=index3.html)
Kadygrov EN, Pick DR (1998) The potential performance of
an angular scanning single channel microwave radiometer
and some comparisons with in situ observations. Meteor
Appl 5: 393–404
Kadygrov EN, Shur GN, Viazankin AS (2003) Investigation
of atmospheric boundary layer temperature, turbulence,
and wind parameters on the basis of passive microwave
remote sensing. Radio Sci 38(3): 8048
Kaimal JC, Finnigan JJ (1994) Atmospheric boundary layer
flows: their structure and measurement. New York:
Oxford University Press, 289 pp
Kaimal JC, Gaynor JE, Finkelstein PL, Graves ME,
Lockhart TJ (1984) A field comparison of in situ meteoro-
logical sensors, Tech. Report, Interagency Agreement No.
DW1-3F2A059. Boulder, CO: NOAA Wave Propagation
Laboratory, 96pp
Kaimal JC, Gaynor JE, Finkelstein PL, Graves ME,
Lockhart TJ (1984) An evaluation of wind measurements
by four Doppler sodars. BAO Rep. 5, Wave Propagation
Laboratory, NOAA=ERL. 110 pp. [Available from
National Technical Information Service, 5285 Port Royal
Road, Springfield, VA 22161.]
Khanna RM, Sharman O, Garg SC (1999) Design of a high
efficiency acoustic phased array antenna for an acoustic
wind profiler. Meteorol Atmos Phys 71: 35–41
Lazarus S, Shapiro A, Droegemeier K (1999) Analysis of
the Gal-Chen-Zhang single-Doppler velocity retrieval.
J Atmos Oceanic Technol 16: 5–18
Lenschow DH (ed) (1986) Probing the atmospheric bound-
ary layer. Boston, MA: Amer Meteor Soc, 269pp
Little CG (1969) Acoustic methods for the remote probing of
the lower atmosphere. Proc. IEEE 57, pp 571–578
Mason CJ, Moses H (1984) Meteorological instrumentation.
In: Atmospheric Science and Power Production
(Randerson D, ed) 81-135, U.S. Dept. Energy, DOE=
TIC-27601, 850 pp
Matejka T, Srivastava RC (1991) An improved version
of the extended velocity-azimuth display analysis of single-
Doppler radar data. J Atmos Oceanic Technol 8: 453–466
Mattis I, Ansmann A, Althausen D, Jaenisch V, Wandinger
U, M€ uller D, Arshinov Y, Bobrovnikov S, Serikov I
(2002) Relative-humidity profiling in the troposphere with
a Raman Lidar. Appl Opt 41: 6451–6462
Mauder M, Foken T (2001) Ergebnisse verschiedener
Turbulenzmessger€atevergleiche. O € sterr Beitr Meteor
Geophys (extended abstract and pdf-file on CD) 27:
216
Mauder M, Foken T (2003) How we classify sonic anemom-
eters=thermometers. Presentation EAE03-A-04254.
Meeting of the European Geophysical Society, Nice,
France, 6–11 April 2003
Moninger WR, Mamrosh RD, Pauley PM (2003) Automated
meteorological reports from commercial aircraft. Bull
Amer Meteor Soc 84(2): 203–216
Mulik KR, Philbrick CR (2000) Raman lidar measurements
of ozone during pollution events. Proc. 20th Int. Laser
Radar Conf., Vichy, France
M€uller D, Wagner F, Althausen D, Wandinger U, Ansmann
A (2000) Physical particle properties of the Indian aerosol
plume derived from six-wavelength lidar observations on
25 March 1999 of the Indian Ocean Experiment. Geophys
Res Lett 27: 1403–1406
National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences,
Commission on Engineering and Technical Systems
(1995) Toward a New National Weather Service – Assess-
ment of NEXRAD Coverage and Associated Weather
Services. Washington, DC: National Academy Press
National Research Council, Committee on Materials, Struc-
tures and Aeronautics for Advanced Uninhabited Air
Vehicles (2000) Uninhabited Air Vehicles: Enabling
Science for Military Systems, publication NMAB-495.
Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 118 pp
National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences,
Committee on Weather Radar Technology Beyond NEX-
RAD, Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate,
Division on Earth and Life Studies (2002) Weather Radar
 Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
Technology – Beyond NEXRAD. Washington, DC:
National Academy Press
National Research Council, Board on Atmospheric Sciences
and Climate (2003) Tracking and predicting the atmo-
spheric dispersion of hazardous material releases: Impli-
cations for homeland security. Washington, DC: National
Academies Press, 93pp
Neff WD (1988) Observations of complex terrain flows
using acoustic sounders: Echo interpretation. Bound
Layer Meteor 42: 207–228
Painting DJ (2003) AMDAR Reference Manual. WMO Rep,
17pp and 2 Appendixes (in press)
Palmer RD, Yu T-Y, Chilson PB (1999) Range imaging using
frequency diversity. Radio Sci 34: 1485–1496
Piironen P, Eloranta EW (1994) Demonstration of a high
spectral resolution lidar based on an iodine absorption
filter. Opt Lett 19: 234–236
Qiu C, Xu Q (1992) A simple adjoint method of wind
analysis for single-Doppler data. J Atmos Oceanic Tech-
nol 9: 588–598
Rinehart RE, Garvey ET (1978) Three-dimensional storm
motion detection by conventional weather radar. Nature
273: 287–289
Roberts R, Saxon T, Mueller C, Wilson J, Crook A, Sun J,
Henry S (1999) Operational application and use of
NCAR’s thunderstorm nowcasting system. Preprints,
15th In. Conf. on Interactive Information and Processing
Systems for Meteorology, Oceanography and Hydrology,
Dallas, TX, Amer Meteor Soc, pp 158–161
Russell PB, Uthe EE (1978) Regional patterns of mixing
depth and stability: Sodar network measurements for
input to air quality models. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 59:
1275–1287
Ryzhkov A, Zrnic D (1998a) Discrimination between rain
and snow with a polarimetric radar. J Appl Meteor 37:
1228–1240
Ryzhkov A, Zrnic D (1998b) Polarimetric rainfall estimation
in the presence of anomalous propagation. J Atmos
Oceanic Technol 15: 1320–1330
Schwerdtfeger P (1976) Physical principles of micro-
meteorological measurements. Amsterdam: Elsevier
Scientific Publishing, 113pp
Seibert P, Beyrich R, Gryning S-E, Joffre S, Rasmussen A,
Tercier P (2000) Review and intercomparison of
operational methods for the determination of mixing
height. Atmos Environ 34(6): 1001–1028
Senff CJ, Hardesty RM, Alvarez RJ, Mayor SD (1999)
Airborne lidar characterization of power plant plumes
during the 1995 Southern Oxidants Study. J Geophys
Res 103: 31,173–31,189
Shellhorn RA (2003) Advances in tethered balloon
sounding technology. Paper 3.3, Proc. of 12th Symp.
on Meteorological Observations and Instrumentation,
Amer Meteor Soc, Long Beach, CA, February 10–13,
2003
Simidchiev DA (1986) Compendium of lecture notes on
meteorological instruments for training class III and class
IV meteorological personnel. WMO No. 622. Geneva,
Switzerland: Secretariat of the World Meteorological
Organization, 625 pp
87
Solheim F, Goodwin JR, Westwater ER, Han Y, Keihm SJ,
Marsh K, Ware R (1998) Radiometric profiling of tem-
perature, water vapor, and cloud liquid water using var-
ious inversion methods. Radio Sci 33: 393–404
Srivastava RC, Matejka TJ, Lorello TJ (1986) Doppler radar
study of the trailing anvil region associated with a squall
line. J Atmos Sci 43: 356–377
Stull RB (1988) An introduction to boundary layer meteo-
rology. Norwell, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers,
666pp
Sun J, Crook NA (1994) Wind and thermodynamic retrieval
from single-Doppler measurements of a gust front observed
during phoenix II. Mon Wea Rev 122: 1075–1091
Sun J, Crook NA (1997) Dynamical and microphysical
retrieval from Doppler radar observations using a cloud
model and its adjoint. Part I: Model development and
simulated data experiments. J Atmos Sci 54: 1642–1661
Sun J, Crook NA (1998) Dynamical and microphysical retrie-
val from Doppler radar observations using a cloud model
and its adjoint. Part II: Retrieval experiments of an observed
Florida convective storm. J Atmos Sci 55: 835–852
Sun J, Crook NA (2000) Real-time low-level wind and
temperature analysis using single WSR-88D data. Wea
Forecast 16: 117–132
Sun J, Flicker DW, Lilly DK (1991) Recovery of three-
dimensional wind and temperature fields from single-
Doppler radar. J Atmos Sci 48: 1311–1328
Troitsky AV, Gaikovich KP, Gromov VD, Kadygrov EN,
Kosov AS (1993) Thermal sounding of the atmospheric
boundary layer in the oxygen band center at 60 GHz.
IEEE Trans. Geosci Remote Sensing 31(1): 116–120
Tuttle JD, Foote GB (1990) Determination of the boundary
layer airflow from a single Doppler radar. J Atmos Ocean-
ic Technol 7: 218–232
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Air Qual-
ity Planning and Standards, Office of Air and Radiation
(2000) Meteorological Monitoring Guidance for Regula-
tory Modeling Applications, Technical Report EPA-
454=R-99-005. Research Triangle Park, NC 27711
(February 2000)
Vaisala (2002) Brochure on Digital IF, 2 pp
Vaisala (2002) Vaisala RK91 low-altitude rocketsonde.
Vaisala Inc., Boulder, CO (www.vaisala.com)
Vaisala (2002) Wind profiling: History, principles, and
applications. Vaisala Technical Note, 58 pp
Vivekanandan J, Yates DN, Brandes EA (1999a) The influ-
ence of terrain on rainfall estimates from radar reflectivity
and specific propagation phase observations. J Atmos
Oceanic Technol 16: 837–845
Vivekanandan J, Ellis SM, Oye R, Zrnic DS, Ryzhkov AV,
Straka J (1999b) Microphysics retrieval using S-band
dual-polarization radar measurements. Bull Amer Meteor
Soc 80: 381–388
Wakimoto RM, Bringi VN (1988) Dual-polarization obser-
vations of microbursts associated with intense convection:
The 20 July storm during the MIST project. Mon Wea Rev
116: 1521–1539
Wakimoto RM, Lee W-C, Bluestein HB, Liu C-H,
Hildebrand PH (1996) ELDORA observations during
VORTEX 1995. Bull Amer Meteor Soc 77: 1465–1481
88 W. F. Dabberdt et al: Advances in meteorological instrumentation for air quality and emergency response
Ware RH, Fulken DW, Stein SA, Anderson DA, Avery SK,
Clark RD, Droegemeier KK, Kuettner JP, Sorooshian S
(2000) Real-time national GPS networks, opportunities
for atmospheric remote sensing. Earth Planets Space 52:
901–905
Warner TT, Brandes EE, Mueller CK, Sun J, Yates DN (2000)
Prediction of a flash flood in complex terrain. Part I: A
comparison of rainfall estimates from radar, and very short
range rainfall simulations from a dynamic model and an
automated algorithmic system. J Appl Meteor 39: 797–814
Webster JG (ed) (1999) The measurement, instrumentation
and sensors handbook. CRC Press, 916pp
Weckwerth TM, Parsons DB, Koch SE, Moore JA, LeMone
MA, Demoz BB, Flamant C, Geerts B, Wang J, Feltz WF
(2003) An overview of the International H2O Project
(IHOP_2002) and some preliminary highlights. Bull
Amer Meteor Soc (submitted)
Westwater ER (1993) Ground-based microwave remote
sensing of meteorological variables. In: Atmospheric
Remote Sensing by Microwave Radiometry (Janssen
M, ed), chap. 4. Wiley, pp 145–213
Westwater ER, Han Y, Irisov VG, Leuskiy V, Kadygrov EN,
Viazankin SA (1999) Remote sensing of boundary layer
temperature profiles by a scanning 5-mm microwave
radiometer and RASS: comparison experiments. J Atmos
Oceanic Technol 16(7): 805–818
Westwater ER, Han Y, Solheim F (2000) Resolution and
accuracy of a multi-frequency scanning radiometer for
temperature profiling. Microw Radiomet Remote Sens
Earth Surf Atmos, pp 129–135
Wieser A, Fiedler F, Corsmeier U (2001) The influence of
the sensor design on wind measurements with sonic
anemometer systems. J Atmos Oceanic Technol 18(10):
1585–1608
Wolff EA, Mercanti EP (eds) (1974) Geoscience instrumen-
tation. New York: Wiley, 819pp
World Meteorological Organization (1983) Guide to meteor-
ological instruments and methods of observation (5th ed.).
WMO No. 8. Geneva, Switzerland: Secretariat of the
World Meteorological Organization
World Meteorological Organization (1996) Guide to meteor-
ological instruments and methods of observation, 6th ed.,
Publication No. 8.
Wu B, Verlinde J, Sun J (2000) Dynamical and microphy-
sical retrieval from Doppler radar observations of a deep
convective cloud. J Atmos Sci 57: 262–283
Wulfmeyer V, B€osenberg J (1998) Ground based differen-
tial-absorption lidar for water-vapor profiling: Assess-
ment of accuracy, resolution, and meteorological
applications. Appl Opt 37: 3825–3844
Wurman J (2002) The multiple-vortex structure of a tornado.
Wea Forecast 17: 473–505
Wurman J, Gill S (2000) Finescale radar observations of the
Dimmitt Texas (2 June 1995) tornado. Mon Wea Rev 128:
2135–2164
Wurman J, Straka JM, Rasmussen EN, Randall M, Zahrai A
(1997) Design and deployment of a portable, pencil-
beam, pulsed, 3-cm Doppler radar. J Atmos Oceanic
Technol 14: 1502–1512
Wylie RG, Lalas T (1992) Measurement of temperature
and humidity. WMO No. 759. Geneva, Switzerland:
Secretariat of the World Meteorological Organization,
71 pp
Xu Q, Qiu C (1994) Simple adjoint methods for single-
Doppler wind analysis with a strong constraints of mass
conservation. J Atmos Oceanic Technol 11: 289–298
Xu Q, Qiu C, Yu J (1994a) Adjoint-method retrievals of low-
altitude wind fields from single Doppler reflectivity mea-
sured during Phoenix II. J Atmos Oceanic Technol 11:
275–288
Xu Q, Qiu C, Yu J (1994b) Adjoint-method retrievals of
low-altitude wind fields from single-Doppler wind data.
J Atmos Oceanic Technol 11: 579–585
Xu Q, Qiu C, Gu H, Yu J (1995) Simple adjoint retrievals of
microburst winds from single Doppler radar data. Mon
Wea Rev 123: 1822–1833
Zhang J, Gal-Chen T (1996) Single-Doppler wind retrieval
in the moving frame of reference. J Atmos Sci 53:
2609–2623
Zrnic DS, Ryzhkov A (1996) Advantages of rain measure-
ments using specific differential phase. J Atmos Oceanic
Technol 13: 454–464
Zrnic DS, Ryzhkov A, Straka J, Liu Y, Vivekanandan J
(2001) Testing a procedure for automatic classification
of hydrometeor types. J Atmos Oceanic Technol 18:
892–913
Zutter HN, Grimmond CSB, Oliphant AJ, Schmid HP, Su
H-B, Ciasto L (2002) Convective boundary layer devel-
opment over a mid-latitude deciduous forest. Preprints
25th Conf. on Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, AMS,
pp 134–145
Authors’ addresses: Walter F. Dabberdt (E-mail: walter.
dabberdt@vaisala.com) and George L. Frederick, Vaisala
Inc., Boulder, CO 80307-3659, USA; R. Michael Hardesty,
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Boulder,
CO 80302, USA; Wen-Chau Lee, National Center for Atmo-
spheric Research, Boulder, CO 80307-3000, USA; Kenneth
Underwood, AeroVironment Inc., Monrovia, CA 91016,
USA