The diurnal cycle of global lightning activity exhibits a sharp peak driven by continental convective heating
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Peer-reviewed literature demonstrates that global and regional lightning activity over continents displays a pronounced diurnal peak during the late afternoon, driven by surface heating and local convective activity.
AbstractAtmospheric processes over the Mexican continental territory can be influenced by the occurrence of tropical cyclones (TCs) over the adjacent oceans. Furthermore, the Mexican territory is characterized by the presence of diurnal cycles of lightning. The Lightning Potential Index (LPI), that is a measure of the potential for charge generation and separation that leads to lightning production in convective storms, was assessed for the diurnal variability of lightning that exhibited a strong diurnal cycle over the Mexican continental territory when TC Bud was over the adjacent eastern Pacific Ocean. The assessment, from 0000 UTC 10 June to 2000 UTC 15 June 2018, used the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model with a new hybrid terrain‐following sigma‐pressure vertical coordinate. Two ensembles with various cumulus and microphysical parameterizations were performed with a grid spacing of 2 km. In one ensemble, sea surface temperature (SST) was prescribed from the Real‐time global (RTG) SST analysis product and allowed to evolve interactively with the modeled atmosphere. Then, all the ensemble members were compared against available observations from the World Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN) to evaluate which model configurations perform best. It is not known if the LPI is capable of reproducing diurnal cycles of lightning over tropical regions; and the results allow gaining an understanding of the LPI when it reproduces the observed diurnal variability of lightning over land. The ensemble members that had better performances were those that included the prescribed SST.
Abstract Data obtained from the Optical Transient Detector and the Lightning Imaging Sensor satellites (70° and 35° inclination low earth orbits, respectively) are used to statistically determine the number of flashes in the seasonal diurnal cycle as a function of local and universal time. These data include corrections for detection efficiency and instrument view time. They are further subdivided by season, land versus ocean, and other spatial (e.g., continents) and temporal (e.g., time of peak diurnal amplitude) categories. These statistics are then combined with analyses of high altitude aircraft observations of electrified clouds to produce the seasonal diurnal variation in the global electric circuit. Continental results display strong diurnal variation, with a lightning peak in the late afternoon and a minimum in late morning. In geographical regions dominated by large mesoscale convective systems, the peak in the diurnal curve shifts toward late evening or early morning hours. The maximum seasonal diurnal flash rate occurs in June–August, corresponding to the Northern Hemisphere summer, while the minimum occurs in December–February. Summer lightning dominates over winter activity and springtime lightning dominates over fall activity at most continental locations. Oceanic lightning exhibits minimal diurnal variation, but morning hours are slightly enhanced over afternoon. As was found earlier, for the annual diurnal variation, using basic assumptions about the mean stor
A series of 40-day non-hydrostatic global simulations was run with the NASA Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) model with horizontal grid spacing ranging from 50 km to 3.5 km. Here we evaluate the diurnal cycle of precipitation and organized convection as a function of resolution. For validation we use the TRMM 3B42 and IMERG precipitation products and 4 km Merged Infrared brightness temperature, focusing on three regions: the contiguous United States (CONUS), the Maritime Continent, and Amazonia. We find that higher resolution has mixed impacts on diurnal phase. Regions dominated by non-local propagating convection show the greatest improvement, with better representation of organized convective systems. Precipitation in regions dominated by local thermodynamic forcing tends to peak too early at high resolution. Diurnal amplitudes in all regions develop unrealistic small-scale variability at high resolution, while amplitudes tend to be underestimated at low resolution. The GEOS model uses the Grell-Freitas scale-aware convection scheme, which smoothly reduces parameterized deep convection with increasing resolution. We find that some parameterized convection is beneficial for the diurnal amplitude and phase even with a 3.5 km model grid, but only when throttled with the scale-aware approach. An additional 3.5 km experiment employing the GFDL microphysics scheme and higher vertical resolution shows further improvement in propagating convection, but an earlier rainfall peak
Abstract In this work, a time dependent lightning emission of nitrogen oxides is introduced in the LMDz general circulation model coupled to the chemistry module INCA using parameterizations for flash location and occurrence, lightning type, NO production per flash and vertical distribution. Major features of observed lightning activity are reproduced by the model as the seasonal cycle and the diurnal variation. Absolute simulated flash frequencies, however, are underestimated compared to observations from the Optical Transient Detector. Sensitivity studies are performed in order to better constrain the source of NOx by lightning. When the global lightning source is scaled to 5 TgN/yr, with vertical profiles specified according to Pickering et al. (1998), simulated concentrations of NO agree well with measurements made by Ridley et al. (1994) during the ELCHEM campaign. We confirm that lightning represents the main source of nitrogen in the tropical upper troposphere and contributes significantly to the total NOx field at northern midlatitudes in summer (20—30 percent). Aircraft emissions provide 5–35 percent of the total NOx in the upper troposphere at northern midlatitudes.
Abstract Satellite observations of lightning flash distribution data are used to examine the diurnal cycle of lightning activity over the tropical and subtropical regions of South America. A harmonic analysis is used to study the spatial variations in the peak and strength of diurnal lightning activity across this area. Results show that in the northern and central regions of South America, the times of maxima in lightning activity was concentrated from late afternoon to evening hours (between 14:00 and 18:00 local time), which may be associated with the peaking of the local convective activity connected with heating of the surface caused by daytime insolation. In subtropical South America, particularly in the area limited by 25°S, 35°S of latitude and 70°W, 50°W of longitude, the time of maximum lightning activity was shifted to nocturnal hours, extending from close to midnight to early morning hours. This behavior can be associated to the peak in mesoscale convective systems in the region which occurs in the morning hours. The annual flash densities in the tropical and subtropical parts of the continent were found to have comparable magnitudes. However, the contribution of the continental tropics to the global electric circuit dominates over the continental subtropics contribution throughout all seasons, since the surface covered by the tropical region is more than twice the area covered by the subtropical region.
Abstract Satellite observations of lightning flash distribution data are used to examine the diurnal cycle of lightning activity over the tropical and subtropical regions of South America. A harmonic analysis is used to study the spatial variations in the peak and strength of diurnal lightning activity across this area. Results show that in the northern and central regions of South America, the times of maxima in lightning activity was concentrated from late afternoon to evening hours (between 14:00 and 18:00 local time), which may be associated with the peaking of the local convective activit
Abstract The contemporaneous pointwise product of convective available potential energy (CAPE) and precipitation is shown to be a good proxy for lightning. In particular, the CAPE × P proxy for lightning faithfully replicates seasonal maps of lightning over the contiguous United States, as well as the shape, amplitude, and timing of the diurnal cycle in lightning. Globally, CAPE × P correctly predicts the distribution of flash rate densities over land, but it does not predict the pronounced land‐ocean contrast in flash rate density; some factor other than CAPE or P is responsible for that land
To understand why tropical islands are rainier than nearby ocean areas, we explore how a highly idealized island, which differs from the surrounding ocean only in heat capacity, might respond to the diurnal cycle and influence the tropical climate, especially the spatial distribution of rainfall and the thermal structure of the troposphere. We perform simulations of three-dimensional radiative-convective equilibrium with the System for Atmospheric Modeling (SAM) cloud-system-resolving model, with interactive surface temperature, where a highly idealized, low heat capacity circular island is em
This study demonstrates the maturing ability of the half-hourly precipitation estimates from the Integrated Multi-satellitE Retrievals for GPM (IMERG) for use in global analyses of the diurnal cycle. The refined intercalibration and interpolation between the sensors in V06 leads to greater consistency in the precipitation retrievals over different hours of the day. Evaluation against ground measurements suggests a slight lag in the diurnal phase of only +0.59 h. We demonstrate the diurnal cycle over different regions around the globe, including the Maritime Continent, where accurate representation of precipitation variability in global models remains a challenge. Using examples over Singapore, Bangladesh, and Lake Victoria, we reveal the intricate interplay between diurnal and seasonal variability. This study demonstrates the unprecedented capability of IMERG in capturing the diurnal cycle of precipitation globally, potentially advancing our understanding in regions of sparse ground measurements and supporting improvements in its representation in global models.
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