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Convective available potential energy

About: Convective available potential energy is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 936 publications have been published within this topic receiving 43773 citations. The topic is also known as: CAPE.


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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The fact that the projected increases in severe environments are robust across a suite of climate models, emerge in response to relatively moderate global warming, and result from robust physical changes suggests that continued increases in greenhouse forcing are likely to increase severe thunderstorm occurrence, thereby increasing the risk of thunderstorm-related damage.
Abstract: Although severe thunderstorms are one of the primary causes of catastrophic loss in the United States, their response to elevated greenhouse forcing has remained a prominent source of uncertainty for climate change impacts assessment. We find that the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project, Phase 5, global climate model ensemble indicates robust increases in the occurrence of severe thunderstorm environments over the eastern United States in response to further global warming. For spring and autumn, these robust increases emerge before mean global warming of 2 °C above the preindustrial baseline. We also find that days with high convective available potential energy (CAPE) and strong low-level wind shear increase in occurrence, suggesting an increasing likelihood of atmospheric conditions that contribute to the most severe events, including tornadoes. In contrast, whereas expected decreases in mean wind shear have been used to argue for a negative influence of global warming on severe thunderstorms, we find that decreases in shear are in fact concentrated in days with low CAPE and therefore do not decrease the total occurrence of severe environments. Further, we find that the shift toward high CAPE is most concentrated in days with low convective inhibition, increasing the occurrence of high-CAPE/low-convective inhibition days. The fact that the projected increases in severe environments are robust across a suite of climate models, emerge in response to relatively moderate global warming, and result from robust physical changes suggests that continued increases in greenhouse forcing are likely to increase severe thunderstorm occurrence, thereby increasing the risk of thunderstorm-related damage.

297 citations

01 Oct 1985
TL;DR: In this article, the authors proposed a parameterization scheme to ensure that the local vertical temperature and moisture structures, which in nature are strongly constrained by convection, be realistic in the large scale model.
Abstract: A marked divergence in philosophy is presented The primary objective of the proposed parameterization scheme is to ensure that the local vertical temperature and moisture structures, which in nature are strongly constrained by convection, be realistic in the large scale model The concept of a quasi-equilibrium between the cloud field and the large-scale forcing has been well established This means that convective regions have characteristic temperature and moisture structures that can be documented observationally and used as the basis of a convective adjustment procedure In the scheme proposed here, the temperature and moisture structures will be adjusted simultaneously toward observed quasi-equilibrium structures This ensures that on the grid scale a global model always maintains a realistic vertical temperature and moisture structure in the presence of convection The saturation point formulation of moist thermodynamics will be used to introduce the observational and theoretical basis of the proposed convective adjustment The scheme is then applied to a series of data sets from GATE, BOMEX, ATEX and an Arctic air-mass transformation to show the sensitivity of the scheme to different parameters and develop a parameter set suitable for both shallow and deep convection in a global model

291 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a series of idealized simulations using a nonhydrostatic cloud model is used to investigate the genesis of bow echoes (a bow-shaped system of convective cells that is especially noted for producing long swaths of damaging surface winds).
Abstract: A series of idealized simulations using a nonhydrostatic cloud model is used to investigate the genesis of bow echoes (a bow-shaped system of convective cells that is especially noted for producing long swaths of damaging surface winds). It is hypothesized that severe, long-lived bow echoes represent a dynamically unique form of mesoconvective organization being produced for a restricted range of environmental conditions, including a convective available potential energy (CAPE) of at least 2000 m2 s2 and vertical wind shears of at least 20 m s−1 over the lowest 2.5–5 km AGL. The key structural features include a 40–100-km-long bow-shaped segment of convective cells, with a strong rear-inflow jet extending to the leading edge of the bow at 2–3 km AGL, and cyclonic and anticyclonic eddies (referred to as “bookend” vortices) on the northern and southern flanks of the bowed segment, respectively. This structure characteristically develops three to four hours into the lifetime of a convective system a...

282 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors synthesize some common synoptic and mesoscale environments conducive to heavy orographic rainfall, including a conditionally or potentially unstable airstream impinging on the mountains, a very moist low-level jet (LLJ), a steep mountain, and a quasi-stationary Synoptic system to slow the convective system over the threat area.
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to synthesize some common synoptic and mesoscale environments conducive to heavy orographic rainfall. Previous studies of U.S. and Alpine cases and new analyses of some Alpine and east Asian cases have shown the following common synoptic and mesoscale environments are conducive to heavy orographic rainfall: 1) a conditionally or potentially unstable airstream impinging on the mountains, 2) a very moist low-level jet (LLJ), 3) a steep mountain, and 4) a quasi-stationary synoptic system to slow the convective system over the threat area. A deep short-wave trough is found to approach the threat area in the U.S. and European cases, but is not found in the east Asian cases. On the other hand, a high convective available potential energy (CAPE) value is observed in east Asian cases, but is not consistently observed in the U.S. and European cases. The enhancement of low-level upward motion and the increase of instability below the trough by the approaching deep short-wave tr...

279 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Williams et al. as mentioned in this paper explored the origin of the difference in lightning between land and sea, and found that strong electrified continental convection is then favored by a larger surface Bowen ratio, and by larger, more strongly buoyant boundary layer parcels which more efficiently transform CAPE to kinetic energy of the updraft in the moist stage of conditional instability.

272 citations


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Performance
Metrics
No. of papers in the topic in previous years
YearPapers
202365
202291
202151
202038
201932
201827