TY - JOUR
T1 - Water vapour characteristics and radiative effects at high-altitude Himalayan sites
AU - Dumka, U. C.
AU - Kaskaoutis, D. G.
AU - Khatri, Pradeep
AU - Ningombam, Shantikumar S.
AU - Sheoran, Rahul
AU - Jade, Sridevi
AU - Shrungeshwara, T. S.
AU - Rupakheti, Maheswar
N1 - Funding Information:
This work supported by the ISRO-ARFI project. The authors thank Prof. Annapurni Subramaniam, Director in the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore, for the kind support and continuous encouragement during the study period. Authors are also thankful to the entire staff of IAO-Hanle for their invaluable support during the data collections. We would like to thank Prof. T. Nakajima for his fruitful discussion and support in the data analysis via the Skyrad.Pack software, version 4.2. U. C. Dumka would like to thank Prof. Dipankar Banerjee, Director ARIES for his constant encouragement and kind supports. D.G.K. acknowledges the support by the project “PANhellenic infrastructure for Atmospheric Composition and climatE change” PANACEA (MIS 5021516), funded by the Operational Program “Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation” (NSRF 2014–2020) and co-financed by Greece and the European Union. The part of this study was supported by NASA and U.S. Agency for international Development . Maheshwar Rupakheti acknowledges the support provided by the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS), which is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF) and the Brandenburg Ministry for Science, Research and Cultur e (MWFK). Authors would like to thank Prof. B. N. Holben (NASA, USA), Prof. S. N. Tripathi and entire AERONET team for providing the data. A part of this work was also carried out under the GVAX campaign under Indo-US joint collaboration. The entire staff of DoE, USA, SPL, IISc, ISRO and ARIES Nainital are highly acknowledged. The water vapour profile, specific humidity and meteorological parameters used in this paper were produced with the Giovanni online data system, developed and maintained by the NASA GES DISC. We thank Dr. H-J. Song for fruitful discussion while estimating the specific humidity profiles using the radiosonde measurements. We thank Prof. Tolga Elbir (Editor-in-Chief), Atmospheric Pollution Research and all the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading and providing us the insightful comments/suggestions in our manuscript.
Funding Information:
This work supported by the ISRO-ARFI project. The authors thank Prof. Annapurni Subramaniam, Director in the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore, for the kind support and continuous encouragement during the study period. Authors are also thankful to the entire staff of IAO-Hanle for their invaluable support during the data collections. We would like to thank Prof. T. Nakajima for his fruitful discussion and support in the data analysis via the Skyrad.Pack software, version 4.2. U. C. Dumka would like to thank Prof. Dipankar Banerjee, Director ARIES for his constant encouragement and kind supports. D.G.K. acknowledges the support by the project ?PANhellenic infrastructure for Atmospheric Composition and climatE change? PANACEA (MIS 5021516), funded by the Operational Program ?Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation? (NSRF 2014?2020) and co-financed by Greece and the European Union. The part of this study was supported by NASA and U.S. Agency for international Development. Maheshwar Rupakheti acknowledges the support provided by the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS), which is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF) and the Brandenburg Ministry for Science, Research and Culture (MWFK). Authors would like to thank Prof. B. N. Holben (NASA, USA), Prof. S. N. Tripathi and entire AERONET team for providing the data. A part of this work was also carried out under the GVAX campaign under Indo-US joint collaboration. The entire staff of DoE, USA, SPL, IISc, ISRO and ARIES Nainital are highly acknowledged. The water vapour profile, specific humidity and meteorological parameters used in this paper were produced with the Giovanni online data system, developed and maintained by the NASA GES DISC. We thank Dr. H-J. Song for fruitful discussion while estimating the specific humidity profiles using the radiosonde measurements. We thank Prof. Tolga Elbir (Editor-in-Chief), Atmospheric Pollution Research and all the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading and providing us the insightful comments/suggestions in our manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Turkish National Committee for Air Pollution Research and Control
PY - 2022/2
Y1 - 2022/2
N2 - We analyze long-term aerosol and precipitable water vapour (PWV) properties at two high-altitude sites (Nainital and Hanle) over the central Himalayan and western Trans-Himalayan region from 2008 to 2018. First-time assessment of the seasonality and variation in combined aerosol and water vapour radiative effects are also attempted, aiming to investigate the atmospheric effect on solar radiation over the Himalayan range that is especially important for the regional climate. A synergy of ground-based measurements from sun photometers, GPS (Global Positioning Systems) observations, radiosondes, along with satellite and reanalysis data was used to examine inter-annual and seasonal variability of PWV and specific humidity over both sites. The PWV is highest in monsoon and much lower during the dry winter season with slightly higher values at Nainital compared to Hanle. This is due to the lower altitude (∼2 km amsl) of Nainital, which is also directly affected by the Indian summer monsoon, compared to the Trans-Himalayan region. The vertical profiles of PWV from satellite and reanalysis data reveal a great consistency on a seasonal basis. The PWV is considered as one of the main greenhouse gases that exhibits a positive radiative effect at the Top of the Atmosphere (TOA) in the order of about 10 W m−2 at Nainital and 7.4 W m−2 at Hanle. The atmospheric radiative effect due to water vapour is about 3–4 times higher compared to aerosols, resulting in atmospheric heating rates of 0.94 and 0.96 K Day−1 at Nainital and Hanle, respectively. The results highlight the importance of water vapour and aerosol radiative effects in the climate sensitive Himalayan range.
AB - We analyze long-term aerosol and precipitable water vapour (PWV) properties at two high-altitude sites (Nainital and Hanle) over the central Himalayan and western Trans-Himalayan region from 2008 to 2018. First-time assessment of the seasonality and variation in combined aerosol and water vapour radiative effects are also attempted, aiming to investigate the atmospheric effect on solar radiation over the Himalayan range that is especially important for the regional climate. A synergy of ground-based measurements from sun photometers, GPS (Global Positioning Systems) observations, radiosondes, along with satellite and reanalysis data was used to examine inter-annual and seasonal variability of PWV and specific humidity over both sites. The PWV is highest in monsoon and much lower during the dry winter season with slightly higher values at Nainital compared to Hanle. This is due to the lower altitude (∼2 km amsl) of Nainital, which is also directly affected by the Indian summer monsoon, compared to the Trans-Himalayan region. The vertical profiles of PWV from satellite and reanalysis data reveal a great consistency on a seasonal basis. The PWV is considered as one of the main greenhouse gases that exhibits a positive radiative effect at the Top of the Atmosphere (TOA) in the order of about 10 W m−2 at Nainital and 7.4 W m−2 at Hanle. The atmospheric radiative effect due to water vapour is about 3–4 times higher compared to aerosols, resulting in atmospheric heating rates of 0.94 and 0.96 K Day−1 at Nainital and Hanle, respectively. The results highlight the importance of water vapour and aerosol radiative effects in the climate sensitive Himalayan range.
KW - Aerosols
KW - Heating rate
KW - Himalayan range
KW - Precipitable water vapour
KW - Radiative effect
KW - Vertical profiles
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85121651617&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85121651617&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.apr.2021.101303
DO - 10.1016/j.apr.2021.101303
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85121651617
VL - 13
JO - Atmospheric Pollution Research
JF - Atmospheric Pollution Research
SN - 1309-1042
IS - 2
M1 - 101303
ER -
