Accuracy assessment of an integrated profiling technique for operationally deriving profiles of temperature, humidity, and cloud liquid water

[1] An integrated profiling technique (IPT) for the simultaneous retrieval of the atmospheric state parameters temperature, humidity, and liquid water content profiles is assessed. The method combines measurements of a modern, ground-based profiling station equipped with a microwave profiler, cloud radar, and ceilometer, with the closest operational radiosonde measurement and standard surface-based meteorological measurements. All are combined within an optimal estimation procedure. The accuracy assessment is carried out in a virtual environment of a regional climate model. The model thermodynamic state is converted into the measurement space via so-called forward modeling. The IPT is then applied to the simulated measurements to retrieve the desired atmospheric state parameters which can be evaluated with the original model state. It is found that IPT-derived temperature and humidity profiles can add significant information for the time period between two operational radiosonde ascents, both if the measurements take place at the radiosonde site or if they are spatially apart. The benefits of a profiling station that applies an IPT can be valuable both for the reprocessing of dedicated field campaign data to obtain the best representation of the atmospheric state and for nowcasting and data assimilation applications. Depending on the density of the given operational radiosonde network, a ground-based profiling station has the potential of either significantly improving the quality of such a network or even substituting a small number of radiosonde stations. A further benefit of a ground-based profiling station is the retrieval of cloud microphysical properties, where IPT liquid water path retrieval accuracies show values better than 10 g m , and liquid water content profiles can be derived with relative accuracies of 30%.