Abstract
Radar data have exciting potential for improving forecasts from operational numerical weather prediction (NWP) models. This potential, already partially realised, arises from a combination of developments. NWP models of the European National Meteorological Services (NMS) are now running routinely at the 10 km grid scale and in a few years will be moving to resolutions of the order of 2 km. Such high resolution models require correspondingly high resolution wind and moisture data for initialisation, which radar networks are well placed to deliver. Secondly, NWP data assimilation techniques have advanced considerably in the 1990s, with the arrival of techniques capable of extracting information from time sequences of observations only indirectly related to model prognostic variables. The first decade of the twenty-first century is likely to see further improvements in computing power, microphysical parametrisation and assimilation methods which will enable better exploitation of the information available from weather radars. Thirdly, developments in radar networking and processing around Europe are beginning to reach a maturity which makes feasible the routine operational delivery of quality controlled radar information of an accuracy sufficient for worthwhile NWP assimilation.
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Macpherson, B. et al. (2004). Assimilation of Radar Data in Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) Models. In: Meischner, P. (eds) Weather Radar. Physics of Earth and Space Environments. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-05202-0_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-05202-0_9
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