Inter-comparison of atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) height estimates from different profiling sensors and models in the framework of HyMeX-SOP1

This paper reports results from an inter-comparison effort involving different sensors and models used to measure the atmospheric boundary layer height (ABLH). The effort took place in the framework of the first Special Observing Period of the Hydrological Cycle in the Mediterranean Experiment (HyMeX-SOP1), with the Raman lidar system BASIL deployed in Candillargues (southern France) and operating in almost continuous mode over the time period September-November 2012. ABLH estimates were obtained based on the application of the Richardson number technique to Raman lidar and radiosonde measurements and to ECMWF-ERA5 reanalysis data. In the effort we considered radiosondes launched in the proximity of the lidar site, as well as radiosondes launched from the closest radiosonde station included in the Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive (IGRA). The inter-comparison effort also includes ABLH measurements from the wind profiler, which rely on the turbulence method, as well as measurements obtained from elastic backscatter lidar signals. The Richardson number approach applied to the on-site radiosonde data is taken as reference. Measurements were carried out throughout the month of October 2012. The inter-comparison is extended to both daytime and night-time data. Results reveal a very good agreement between the different approaches, with values of the correlation coefficient R-2 for all compared data pairs in the range 0.94-0.98. Values of the slope of the fitting line in the regression analysis are in the range 0.91-1.08 for daytime comparisons and in the range 0.95-1.03 for night-time comparisons, which testifies to the presence of the very small biases affecting all five ABLH estimates with respect to the reference ABLH estimate, with slightly smaller bias values found at night. Results also confirm that the combined application of different methods to the sensors and model data allows us to get accurate and cross-validated estimates of the ABL height in a variety of weather conditions. Correlations between the ABLH measurements and other atmospheric dynamic and thermodynamic variables, such as CAPE (convective available potential energy), friction velocity and relative humidity, are also evaluated to infer possible mutual dependences.