Collaborative Research: Further Investigations from the Seeded and Natural Orographic Wintertime clouds: the Idaho Experiment (SNOWIE)

几十年来，在美国西部和全球其他地区通过播云来增强降水。在云层中有大量液态水的山区，尝试人工降雨的主要天气条件之一。从释放播云材料到降水形成的一系列事件的直接观测证据显示在最近nsf支持的野外活动的数据中。该奖项将为研究人员提供进一步分析该活动数据的机会，以回答有关人工降雨背后的科学问题。这项研究代表了nsf资助的科学家和提供水力发电的公用事业公司之间的公私合作关系。下一代科学家也将在这个项目中得到培训。研究小组将扩大对2017年进行的“播种和自然地形冬季云：爱达荷实验”（SNOWIE）的实地活动数据的分析。初步结果显示，在某些情况下，地形区域的播云可以引发降雪。研究小组将超越明显的人工降雨影响案例，分析活动期间的每一个案例，包括在自然降雪的情况下进行人工降雨的案例。该项目的总体目标是在不确定性限制的情况下，为所有降雪事件提供冰川云播种对降水增强的估计。这将涉及使用SNOWIE数据集和最先进的建模进行耦合数据分析。研究人员已经确定了一系列问题来解决以下研究假设：1)在大多数层状地形云中观测到的中尺度和微尺度上升气流是产生过冷液态水的焦点区域，有时也会产生天然冰粒；2)在适当的条件下，空中播撒地形云，即使在自然降水发生的情况下，也会产生云和降水的微物理性质变化，这些变化可以通过原位和远程传感器检测到；通过数值模拟，利用观测资料的分析改进了播种参数化，可以定量估计山区流域降水的影响，并确定不确定性。美国国家科学基金会支持的研究人员将与国家大气研究中心和爱达荷州电力公司的研究人员合作。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Precipitation enhancement through cloud seeding has taken place in the Western United States and other regions around the globe for several decades. One of the main weather regimes where cloud seeding is attempted is in mountainous terrain in areas where there is a significant amount of liquid water in the clouds. Direct observational evidence of the chain of events from the release of cloud seeding material to the formation of precipitation was shown in data from a recent NSF-supported field campaign. This award will provide researchers with the opportunity to further analyze data from that campaign to answer additional questions about the science behind cloud seeding. The research represents a public-private partnership between NSF-sponsored scientists and a utility that provides hydroelectric power. The next generation of scientists will also be trained during this project.The research team will expand upon the analysis of field campaign data from the Seeded and Natural Orographic Wintertime clouds: the Idaho Experiment (SNOWIE) that was conducted in 2017. Initial results have shown that cloud seeding in orographic regions can initiate snowfall in certain situations. The research team will move beyond the obvious cases of cloud seeding impacts to analyze every case during the campaign, including those where cloud seeding was conducted while natural snowfall was also occurring. The overarching goal of the project is to provide estimates, with uncertainty limits, of precipitation enhancement from glaciogenic cloud seeding for all SNOWIE seeding events. This will involve coupling data analysis using the SNOWIE data set and state of the art modeling. The researchers have identified a set of questions to address the following research hypotheses: 1) Mesoscale and microscale updrafts observed in mostly stratiform orographic clouds are focal areas for the production of supercooled liquid water and sometimes natural ice particles, 2) Airborne seeding of orographic clouds, under the right conditions, will produce changes in microphysical properties of clouds and precipitation detectable with in-situ and remote sensors, even in conditions where natural precipitation is occurring, and 3) For all SNOWIE cases, seeding impacts on precipitation over a mountain basin can be estimated quantitatively, and uncertainties established, through numerical simulations employing seeding parameterizations improved utilizing analyses from the observations. NSF-supported researchers will collaborate with researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and the Idaho Power Company.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.