Abstract
Studies have shown a systematic error in the Kipp & Zonen large-aperture scintillometer (K&ZLAS) measurements of the sensible heat flux, H. We improved on these studies and compared four K&ZLASs with a Wageningen large-aperture scintillometer at the Chilbolton Observatory. The scintillometers were installed such that their footprints were the same and independent flux measurements were made along the measurement path. This allowed us to compare H and the direct scintillometer output, the refractive index structure parameter, \({C_{n}^{2}}\) . Furthermore, spectral analysis was performed on the raw scintillometer signal to investigate the characteristics of the error. Firstly, correlation coefficients ≥ 0.99 confirm the robustness of the scintillometer method, and secondly we discovered two systematic errors: the low-\({C_{n}^{2}}\) error and the high-\({C_{n}^{2}}\) error. The low-\({C_{n}^{2}}\) error is a non-linear error that is caused by high-frequency noise, and we suspect the error to be caused by the calibration circuit in the receiver. It varies between each K&ZLAS, is significant for H ≤ 50 W m−2, and we propose a solution to remove this error using the demodulated signal. The high-\({C_{n}^{2}}\) error identified by us is the systematic error found in previous studies. We suspect this error to be caused by poor focal alignment of the receiver detector and the transmitter light-emitting diode that causes ineffective use of the Fresnel lens in the current Kipp & Zonen design. It varies between each K&ZLAS (35% up to 240%) and can only be removed by comparing with a reference scintillometer in the field.
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Acknowledgments
First of all we thank Charles Wrench and Darcy Ladd from the Chilbolton Observatory formaking their wonderful facilities available to us. Furthermore we thank Jonathan Evans from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Wallingford for his great help during the experiment and providing two K&ZLASs to us. We also thank Sue Grimmond and Mariana Gouvea from King’s College London for their help and making available to us two K&ZLASs. Furthermore,we thank Jan, Mal, Judy, Joe, Owain, Dave, and Lorna for their assistance, kindness and hospitality during all parts of the experiment. Finally we thank two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments. This research was supported by the Dutch Technology Foundation (STW) under project number WTC7484.
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Open Access This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0), which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
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Van Kesteren, B., Hartogensis, O.K. Analysis of the Systematic Errors Found in the Kipp & Zonen Large-Aperture Scintillometer. Boundary-Layer Meteorol 138, 493–509 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-010-9564-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-010-9564-2