TES Water Vapor Isotope Data used to Evaluate Moisture Processes in Climate Models

Differences between TES data and climate models are due to rainfall, evaporation and mixing processes: These processes have a significant impact on the tropical moisture budget and on trace gas transport but until recently there have been few measurements to evaluate their representation in models.

Conclusion: Efficiency of rainfall evaporation explains much of the difference in isotopic composition of water vapor for models over the tropical oceans and continents

Figure "a" shows the TES data averaged over a year. Figures "b" and "d" show the model estimates with different rainfall evaporation efficiencies

Figures "c" and "e" show the difference between model and data. Figure "e" shows the best overall agreement

From Yoshimura et al., JGR 2011

08.04.2011