Shallow Cumulus in the Southeastern U.S. Simulated by Various WRF configurations

Shallow cumulus make important contributions to the radiation budget and vertical transport of pollutants and water. Mesoscale models often have trouble simulating shallow cumulus well, a potentially major source of error. In this presentation, I will compare satellite-derived cloud variables with simulations from several configurations of the WRF model for a field campaign in June and July 2013 in the Southeastern U.S. (SENEX). Shallow cumulus was present in much of the domain on most days during the campaign. An integrated PBL and shallow cloud parameterization (TEMF) is contrasted with separate PBL and shallow-cloud schemes. The configurations also differ in land-surface and atmospheric initialization.