Effect of intense wind shear across the inversion on stratocumulus clouds

[1] A large-eddy simulation model is used to examine the impact of the intense cross-inversion wind shear on the stratocumulus cloud structure. The wind shear enhanced entrainment mixing effectively reduces the cloud water and thickens the inversion layer. It leads to a reduction of the turbulence kinetic energy (TKE) production in the cloud layer due to the weakened cloud-top radiative cooling and the formation of a turbulent and cloud free sublayer within the inversion. The thickness of the sublayer increases with the enhanced wind shear intensity. Under the condition of a weaker inversion, the enhanced shear mixing within the inversion layer even lowers the cloud-top height and reduces the entrainment velocity. Finally, increasing wind shear or reducing inversion strength tends to create an inversion layer with a constant bulk Richardson number ( 0.3), suggesting that an equilibrium value of the Richardson number is reached. Citation: Wang, S., J.-C. Golaz, and Q. Wang (2008), Effect of intense wind shear across the inversion on stratocumulus clouds, Geophys. Res. Lett., 35, L15814, doi:10.1029/ 2008GL033865.