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Snow-mass intercomparisons in the boreal forests from general circulation models and remotely sensed data sets

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

James Foster ,
Randy Koster ,
Helga Behr ,
Lydia Dümenil ,
Judah Cohen ,
Richard Essery ,
Glen Liston ,
Starley Thompson ,
David Pollard  and
Diana Verseghy
James Foster
Affiliation:
NASA, Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771, USA
Randy Koster
Affiliation:
NASA, Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771, USA
Helga Behr
Affiliation:
University of Hamburg, Meteorology Institute, Hamburg 20146, Germany
Lydia Dümenil
Affiliation:
University of Hamburg, Meteorology Institute, Hamburg 20146, Germany
Judah Cohen
Affiliation:
NASA, Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York, New York 10025, USA
Richard Essery
Affiliation:
United Kingdom Meteorological Office, Hadley Climate Centre, Bracknell, Berkshire RG12 2SZ
Glen Liston
Affiliation:
Colorado State University, Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Ft Collins, Colorado 80523, USA
Starley Thompson
Affiliation:
National Center for Atmospheric Research, Interdisciplinary Climate Systems, PO Box 3000, Boulder, Colorado 80307, USA
David Pollard
Affiliation:
National Center for Atmospheric Research, Interdisciplinary Climate Systems, PO Box 3000, Boulder, Colorado 80307, USA
Diana Verseghy
Affiliation:
Canadian Climate Centre, Atmospheric Environment Service, Downsview, Ontario M3H 5T4, Canada
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Abstract

In much of the boreal forests, snow covers the ground for half of the year. Since these boreal forests comprise approximately 15% of the land normally covered by snow during the winter and upwards of 40% of the land surface normally snow-covered during the spring and autumn, reliable measures of snow cover and snow mass are required for improved energy-balance and water-balance estimates. In this study, results from snow-depth climatological data (SDC), passive microwave satellite data, and output from general circulation models (GCMs) have been intercompared for the boreal forests of both North America and Eurasia. In Eurasia, during the winter months, snowmass estimates from these data sets correspond rather well; however, in North America, the passive microwave estimates are smaller than the estimates from the climatological data and the modeled data. The underestimation results primarily from the effects of vegetation on the microwave signal. The reason why the underestimation is a bigger problem in North America than in Eurasia is likely due to the use of global microwave algorithms that have not accounted for regional differences in the size of snow grains. The GCMs generally produce too much snow in the spring season. This is a result of the models having moisture amounts that are greater and temperatures that are slightly lower than observed, in the late winter and early spring periods. The models compare more favorably with the SDC in the Eurasian boreal forest than in the forests of North America during the winter season. However, in the spring, the model results for the North America boreal forest are in better agreement with the SDC than are the forests of Eurasia.

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Articles
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Polar Record , Volume 32 , Issue 182 , July 1996 , pp. 199 - 208
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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