Solar radiation and rainfall

In the UK rain comes mainly from the moist south-westerly winds and from the many depressions which cross fiom west to east. Western areas receive much more rain than eastern areas this is partly due to the west to east movement of the rain-bearing air and also becanse most of the high land is along the western side of the country. As the moistnre-laden air rises over this high gronnd it is cooled, its ability to hold moistnre decreases and this moisture is deposited as rain. On the leeward (sheltered) side of the mountain the air is drier and warmer. This is sometimes known as a rain shadow effect. 

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The rainfall regime in arid/semi-arid areas is characterized by low, irregular and unpredictable precipitation, often concentrated in a few rainstorms, creating humid conditions in the soil for a short period and over a limited area. In semi-arid areas, this irregularity gradually disappears. The moisture supplied to the soil from rain is offset by evaporation that is enhanced by low air humidity, high solar radiation and high air temperature. 

Various methods have been developed for measuring many of the factors that influence atmospheric corrosion. The quantity and composition of pollutants in the atmosphere, the amount collected on surfaces under a variety of conditions, and the variation of these with time have been determined. Temperature, RH, wind direction and velocity, solar radiation, and amount of rainfall are easily recorded. Not so easily determined are dwelling time of wetness (TOW), and the surface contamination by corrosive agents such as sulfur dioxide and chlorides. However, methods for these determinations have been developed and are in use at various test stations. By monitoring these factors and relating them to corrosion rates, a better understanding of atmospheric corrosion can be obtained. 

Boundary layer models take a similar approach but attempt to extend the parameterization of gas exchange to individual micrometeorological processes including transfer of heat (solar radiation effects including the cool skin), momentum (friction, waves, bubble injection, current shear), and other effects such as rainfall and chemical enhancements arising from reaction with water. 

WeatherHawk 916 Wireless Weather Station providing measurements of air temperature, wind speed, solar radiation, relative humidity, wind direction, barometric pressure, and rainfall, storing up to 22 days of data and daily ETo (evapotranspiration) information. (Courtesy of WeatherHawk.)... 

Jerusalem artichoke thrives under a wide range of growing conditions. However, yields can be greatly affected by environmental factors, including solar radiation, temperature, length of the growing season, and rainfall. 

All crop production, except protected cropping (for example, glasshouse, plastic covered), is vulnerable to the weather. Measures to combat frost and drought are common to most kinds of crop production wind protection (by shelter belts and so on) is practised for only a few crops (e.g. top fruit). In general, apart from choice of location, little can be done about solar radiation, rainfall or temperature. Problems with weeds, pests and diseases are also common to all crops but the remedies available to organic producers are much more limited than for conventional farmers. 

In order to achieve some degree of uniformity, Florida, USA, is often taken as a reference location for such comparisons [3] because the subtropical climate of that region combines high and fairly consistent UV irradiation with high rain and humidity levels. Desert test stations, such as those in Arizona and in some parts of AustraUa, are also popular they receive more UV radiation but less moisture. At the test stations, it is usual to expose flat panel samples, facing the equator, at 5° or 45° to the horizontal, for twelve month periods or multiples of twelve months. Solar energy levels, UV radiation, humidity and rainfall records are kept so that different periods can be compared. 

If a real world problan is sought that is inherently messy, where mathematical functions are difficult to apply, uncertainty modeling processes wonld be an excellent example. Engineering processes, at or near the land surface depend on topography, vegetation, and soil moisture, rainfall patterns and intensity, potential evapo-transpiration, air tanperatures, solar radiation, winds, and dew points. Each of the variables changes either in space or in time, and many change in both space and time. Nonetheless, it is necessary to calculate such processes in this real world... 

Their area s evaporation rate was 1270-1780 mm (50-70 in.)/yr, and the rainfall very little most years (10-30 mm), but on rare occasions there were heavy storms. The solar radiation in the area was 6.3 X 10 cal/m /day, the relative humidity as low as 5%, and moderately intense winds arose in the afternoons. Brine was initially pumped at 1000 gpm from three wells that were 30 m (100 ft) deep to fill the ponds to an average 38 cm depth (Anon., 1984a). After the halite ponds the brine was mixed with calcium chloride and end-liquor from the processing plant to precipitate gypsum and some of the boron, with the precipitate being washed to recover some of the entrained liquor s lithium content. The salt was harvested from the halite ponds once per year and placed in stockpiles, while... 

Cycles established as statistically real are the familiar annual and diurnal radiation/temperature cycles, a quasibiennial (about every 2 years) fluctuation in various climatic elements, and the interannual variability of June rainfall in northern India. The first merely means that winters are cooler than summers and nights are cooler than days. Examples of the second cycle include Midwestern rainfall, a lengthy temperature record from central England, and winds over the western Paciflc and eastern Indian Ocean. According to Campbell et al (19), the third cycle may be a response to the monthly solar-lunar tide and its influence on the monsoon circulation. 

The latter two properties create the problem Because of the insolubility in water, they are not removed by rainfall, and they are inert towards the hydroxyl radical. The reaction with this radical to form water is the process, that initiates the oxidation of hydrocarbons. Thus the CFCs are not removed by the common cleansing mechanisms that operate in the lower atmosphere, instead they rise into the stratosphere, where they are destroyed by solar short-wave UV-radiation releasing the ozone-depleting chlorine atoms. Because transport into the stratosphere is very slow, the residence time for CFC s in the environment is extremely long, up to the order of one century, so they accumulate in the atmosphere. 

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