21st Conference on Climate Variability and Change

P6.6

Diurnal and seasonal wind variability for selected stations in central and northern california climate regions

Charles J. Fisk, Naval Base Ventura County, Point Mugu, CA

Using a subset of stations that are included in the Western Regional Climate Center's Central and Northern California climate regions, this study surveys their diurnal and monthly wind climatologies, utilizing a graphical methodology which comprehensively depicts the climatological wind variation on single page layouts. The regions include the San Joaquin Valley, Central Coast, Sacramento Delta, Sierra, Northeast, North Central, and North Coast.

The graphical methodology is the Two-Way Time-Section climogram, an analog to the topographical map - calendar month replacing North/South or the y-axis, and hour of the day replacing East-West or the the X-axis. The various points on the graph represent the wind climatological parameter statistics for a given month and hour of the day. Among other features, the points can be contoured and areas of the graph with similar properties colored to lend additional insights.

Three types of graphs are employed: Mean Vector Wind/Constancy, Prevailing Winds (Direction, Pct Occurrence Frequencies, and Mean Speeds from that direction), and Mean overall scalar speeds/Pct of Time with Calms.

This is a followup to a study presented at the 20th conference that similarly analyzed diurnal and season wind climatologies for selected stations in the Southern California climate regions.

extended abstract  Extended Abstract (2.8M)

Poster Session 6, Seasonal-interannual variability
Wednesday, 14 January 2009, 2:30 PM-4:00 PM, Hall 5

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