AgI plumes in WRF LES simulations versus airborne measurements

Inadequate or uncertain targeting of seedable clouds from silver iodide (AgI) ground-based generators has been a complex and hence a long-standing problem in winter orographic cloud seeding programs. To address this issue within the Wyoming Weather Modification Pilot Program (WWMPP), a focused field experiment was conducted between 9 February and 1 March 2011. Airborne measurements of AgI-generated ice nuclei (IN) plumes from ground-based generators were carried out by Weather Modification Inc. using a Piper Cheyenne II research aircraft equipped with an updated NCAR acoustic IN counter. The airborne data were collected over the Wyoming Medicine Bow and Sierra Madre mountain ranges on nine different days within the experimental period. This study explores the ability of the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model to reproduce reasonable AgI plumes by comparing the model results with these airborne measurements. A suite of WRF simulations, including 2.5 km and 500 m runs along with two 100-m resolution Large Eddy Simulations (LES), have been conducted for the 16 February case over the Medicine Bow range. Two different sets of gridded data, the North America Regional Reanalysis data and the WWMPP Real-Time Four-Dimensional Data Assimilation WRF forecast data, were used to drive the model independently. An AgI point-source module was applied to represent the release of AgI from the ground generators. A detailed description of the WRF LES results and comparisons with the airborne measurements will be presented at the conference.