All-sky Satellite Radiance

[Akeem Dawes]

Hello

I am new to RTTOV and am learning to apply it to WRF-DART to assimilate real satellite radiance observations. I would like to know if RTTOV 13 supports all-sky radiance simulation? If so how would it be enabled if not enabled by default?

Thank you for your time.

[James Hocking]

Hi,

My colleague has responded to your help desk query asking the same question. For the benefit of other users I have copied his reply below.

Best wishes,
James

RTTOV has a simple cloud calculation which can be used for single layer optically thick water clouds at mid-infrared wavelengths but is also capable of handling more complex cloud types and/or multi-layer clouds RTTOV using multiple scattering calculations (e.g. DOM). These calculations require additional (instrument specific) coefficients containing cloud properties and aerosol scattering properties which are also available on the NWP SAF website.

RTTOV provides quite a few independent options for treating the thermal emission and solar source terms in IR (and visible) scattering simulations so it’s worth having a look through the user guide to see how to enable any specific functionality (and models) you are studying. The specific sections are 8.5 (cloudy radiances) and 8.6 (aerosol affected radiances) (pp. 66-77)

If you have downloaded and built RTTOV already, there are some test scripts which exercise quite a lot of those specific options which you might like to have a look at in the rttov_test

Please feel free to get in touch again if you have a more specific query

[Akeem Dawes]

Ok noted. Thank you.

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