Bottom: Height-time displays of vertical velocity variance, skewness, and kurtosis.
The ARM Facility currently operates several scanning coherent Doppler lidar systems at various sites around the globe. These instruments operate in the near infrared and provide measurements of radial velocity, attenuated aerosol backscatter, and signal-to-noise ratio. Previously shared with the ARM user community as an evaluation product, these data are now in production and available as two Doppler lidar profile value-added products (VAPs).
The Doppler Lidar Wind (DLPROFWIND4NEWS) VAP calculates profiles of horizontal winds from plan-position-indicator scans that are performed several times per hour. These wind measurements in the atmospheric boundary layer are particularly important for modeling pollutant and aerosol transport.
The Doppler lidar vertical velocity and cloud statistics (DLPROFWSTATS4NEWS) VAP produces height- and time-resolved estimates of vertical velocity variance, skewness, and kurtosis from 1-second vertically pointing measurements. This VAP also estimates cloud properties from the vertically pointing measurements, including cloud-base height, cloud frequency, cloud-base vertical velocity, and cloud-base updraft fraction. The Doppler lidar depends on scattering from aerosols, and thus, this VAP only produces data below clouds at heights with sufficient aerosol loading.
Both VAPs produce data operationally and are available in the ARM Data Archive within a few days of the measurements.
As always, feedback and use of the data are welcomed and encouraged. For questions, or to report data problems, please contact principal investigator Laura Riihimaki.
To access the Doppler lidar profiles, visit the VAP page or log into the ARM Data Archive. Go here to request an account.
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The ARM Climate Research Facility is a national scientific user facility funded through the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science. The ARM Facility is operated by nine Department of Energy national laboratories, including Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, which manages Data Management Facility that processes raw data from all the ARM research sites and provides selected instrumentation and value-added product development.