Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology Commons^™

Factories - Friends Or Foes?, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objective: Students will be able to role play various points of view considering placement of a factory and its effects on air quality.

National Science Education Standards:

Standard E - Understandings about science and technology

Standard F -

• Personal health
• Populations, resources, and environments
• Natural hazards
• Risks and benefits
• Science and technology in society

Standard G - Science as a human endeavor

Drawing Isotherms, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:
1. Students will be able to define and draw isotherms to analyze temperature variations.
2. Students will be able to compare and contrast temperature variations on a weather map.

National Science Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding of: structure of earth system, science and technology, risks and benefits, and science and technology in society.

Structure Of The Atmosphere, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding of: abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties and changes of properties in matter, understandings about science and technology, and structure of the earth system.

Mid-Latitude Cyclones, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding about scientific inquiry, structure of the earth system, and understandings about science and technology.

Fronts, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should be able to develop an understanding about scientific inquiry, structure of earth system, and understandings about science and technology.

Precipitation Patterns, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objective: Students will demonstrate the relationship between precipitation types and surface temperatures.They will use forecast maps to predict where snow or rain will fall over the next several days.

National Science Education Standards – As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an
understanding of structure of the earth system.

Patterns Of Temperature, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:

1. Students will analyze temperature distributions on a map.
2. Students will compare and contrast temperature variations on a weather map.

National Science Standards: All students should develop an understanding of: structure of earth system, science and technology, risks and benefits, and science and technology in society.

Air Pressure And Weather, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objective: Students will learn about relationships between air pressure and weather changes.

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop: understandings about scientific inquiry, structure of the earth system, and understanding about science and technology.

Decoding Metar Data, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives: Students will decode a METAR report and convert the decoded METAR data to a station model plot.

National Science Education Standard: All students should develop an understanding of: abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties and changes of properties in matter, understandings about science and technology, and structure of the earth system.

Weather Maps And Fronts, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objective: Students will use symbol knowledge learned from previous lessons to read and understand warm and cold fronts on a weather map.

National Science Education Standards:
All students should develop an understanding of:
properties of earth materials and changes in earth
and sky.

Upper Air Plots, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives: Students will study air patterns at three different levels of the troposphere.

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding of: abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties and changes of properties in matter, understandings about science and technology, and structure of the earth system.

Do The Dewpoint!, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:
1.Students will observe examples of condensation and deposition.
2. Students will observe, record, and analyze data.

National Science Education Standards: All students should develop: abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties of earth materials,and changes in earth and sky.

Reading Universal Time, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding about science and technology, and science and technology in society.

Air Masses, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:
• Students will learn and become familiar with the four air masses: cold and dry; cold and humid; hot and dry; and hot and humid.
• Students will learn that air masses have specific characteristics: temperature and humidity, the leading edge of the air mass is called the front, a front is the boundary between two air masses, and movement of air masses brings certain weather conditions with it.

National Science Education Standards: All students should develop: abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties of earth materials, and changes in earth and sky.

Winds Around Highs And Lows, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding of motions and forces, structure of the earth system, and understandings about science and technology.

Reading And Using Meteograms, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:Students learn how hourly weather data is plotted on a meteogram, and how to interpret the data. They will relate meteogram data to surface weather maps.

National Science Education Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding of: abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties and changes of properties in matter, understandings about science and technology, and structure of the earth system.

As a result of their activities in grades 9-12, all students should develop an understanding of Energy in the earth System: The sun is the major external source of energy; Heating …

Weather Station Plots, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:

•Students will learn basic weather symbols used on weather station plots
•Students will learn, read and interpret the symbols

National Science Education Standards: All students should develop an understanding of: properties of earth materials and changes in earth and sky.

Particulate Matter Matters!, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

National Science Education Standards:

• CONTENT STANDARD D: Science as Inquiry
• CONTENT STANDARD E: Understandings about science and technology
• CONTENT STANDARD F: Personal and community health; Environmental quality

Where Is It Hot Or Cold?, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objective: Students will be able to access a web site that will allow them to understand temperature readings and patterns across the United States.

National Science Education Standard: As a result of their activities in grades K-4, all students should develop an understanding of: Properties of earth materials, objects in the sky, changes in earth and sky. Weather changes from day to day and over the seasons. Weather can be described by measurable quantities, such as temperature, wind direction and speed, and precipitation.

Drawing Isobars, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:
1. Students will be able to define and draw isobars to analyze air pressure variations.
2. Students will be able to identify highs and lows on the analyzed maps.

National Science Standards: As a result of activities in grades 5-8, all students should develop an understanding of: structure of earth system, science and technology, risks and benefits, and science and technology in society.

How Fast Does The Wind Blow?, Storm Project

Open Educational Resources

Objectives:
• The student will construct an anemometer and calculate the wind speed.
• The student will examine a weather map to determine wind speed and wind direction using the weather station model.

National Science Standards: All students should develop an understanding of:abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry, properties of objects and materials, position and motion of objects, properties of earth materials, and changes in earth and sky.

Agricultural Climatology, Kenneth G. Hubbard

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

With the diversification of the U.S. economy over the past century, agriculture has changed. We can say the farm sizes have increased over time, the number of farmers and those employed in farming have decreased over time, and as the economy has grown the relative contribution of agriculture to the total economy has decreased due to growth in other sectors. The farm prices have not changed significantly over many years while costs for energy, machinery, and land have generally increased. The combination of these factors has generally narrowed the profit margin and the highest productivity will no longer ensure the …

Droughtscape, Winter 2007, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

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Policy Update: NIDIS is Law. What’s Next?

What Would You Like to See?

TX, OK, Plains, Southwest Hardest Hit in 2006

Climatologically Speaking, How Bad Was It?

State Spotlight: Arizona

Drought Decision-Support Tools Evolving

Note On The Ndvi-Lst Relationship And The Use Of Temperature-Related Drought Indices Over North America, D. Sun, Menas Kafatos

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

A comprehensive evaluation of the relationship between vegetation and Land Surface Temperature (LST) over the North America is presented. It is found that the correlations between LST and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) depend on the season-of-year and time-of-day. For winter, the correlation between NDVI and LST is positive. The strong negative correlations between LST and NDVI are only found during the warm seasons. Thus temperature-related drought indices may only be used in the warm seasons from May to October, and should be used with caution during cold seasons in North America. The cooling effect of vegetation on LST is …

Improved Associated Conditions In Rapid Intensifications Of Tropical Cyclones, Ruixin Yang, J. Tang, Menas Kafatos

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Rapid intensification (RI) of tropical cyclones (TC) is a major error source in TC intensity forecasting. In order to improve the estimates of RI probability, association rules are used to facilitate the process of mining for candidate sets of conditions. Compared to the relation analysis method, the technique of association rules can simply explore associations among multiple conditions. Our mining results identified a reduced predictor set with fewer factors identified in previous studies but improved RI probabilities. That is, the RI probability with three conditions satisfied: low vertical shear, high humidity, and the TC being in an intensification phase is …

Simulation Of The Recent Multidecadal Increase Of Atlantic Hurricane Activity Using An 18-Km-Grid Regional Model, Thomas R. Knutson, Joseph J. Sirutis, Stephen T. Garner, Isaac M. Held, Robert E. Tuleya

CCPO Publications

In this study, a new modeling framework for simulating Atlantic hurricane activity is introduced. The model is an 18-km-grid nonhydrostatic regional model, run over observed specified SSTs and nudged toward observed time-varying large-scale atmospheric conditions (Atlantic domain wavenumbers 0-2) derived from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) reanalyses. Using this "perfect large-scale model" approach for 27 recent August-October seasons (1980-2006), it is found that the model successfully reproduces the observed multidecadal increase in numbers of Atlantic hurricanes and several other tropical cyclone (TC) indices over this period. The correlation of simulated versus observed hurricane activity by year varies from …

Precipitation Monitoring At Yucca Mountain, Klaus J. Stetzenbach, Amanda Brandt

Publications (YM)

Objectives:

Status of the Task to Date
Network Overview/ Equipment
Data Trends
Uses and Collaborative Projects
Spatial Interpolation of YM Rainfall
Storm Event Analysis
Shallow Groundwater Response to Rainfall
UE29a1 Water Level Response to Barometric Pressure Fluctuation

Yucca Mountain Climate: Past, Present, And Future, Saxon E. Sharpe

Publications (YM)

Evaluation of modern climate is necessary to relate climatic events to near-surface processes such as infiltration, runoff, and evapotranspiration. Modern climate information also aids in environmental analyses of repository design facilities and atmospheric dispersion models. Evaluation of past climate regimes, particularly temperature and precipitation, is needed to assess the relation of past climate to past hydrologic conditions. Estimates of potential future climate and hydrology are needed to evaluate repository performance.

Stratospheric Variability And Trends In Models Used For The Ipcc Ar4, P. M. De F. Forster, Eugene Cordero

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

Atmosphere and ocean general circulation model (AOGCM) experiments for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) are analyzed to better understand model variability and assess the importance of various forcing mechanisms on stratospheric trends during the 20th century. While models represent the climatology of the stratosphere reasonably well in comparison with NCEP reanalysis, there are biases and large variability among models. In general, AOGCMs are cooler than NCEP throughout the stratosphere, with the largest differences in the tropics. Around half the AOGCMs have a top level beneath ~2 hPa and show a significant cold bias in their …

Assessment Of Temperature, Trace Species, And Ozone In Chemistry-Climate Model Simulations Of The Recent Past, V. Eyring, N. Butchart, D. W. Waugh, H. Akiyoshi, J. Austin, S. Bekki, G. E. Bodeker, B. A. Boville, C. Brühl, M. P. Chipperfield, E. Cordero, M. Dameris, M. Deushi, V. E. Fioletov, S. M. Frith, R. R. Garcia, A. Gettelman, M. A. Giorgetta, V. Grewe, L. Jourdain, D. E. Kinnison, E. Mancini, E. Manzini, M. Marchand, D. R. Marsh, T. Nagashima, P. A. Newman, J. E. Nielsen, S. Pawson, G. Pitari, D. A. Plummer, E. Rozanov, M. Schraner, T. G. Shepherd, K. Shibata, R. S. Stolarski, H. Struthers, W. Tian, M. Yoshiki

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

[1] Simulations of the stratosphere from thirteen coupled chemistry-climate models (CCMs) are evaluated to provide guidance for the interpretation of ozone predictions made by the same CCMs. The focus of the evaluation is on how well the fields and processes that are important for determining the ozone distribution are represented in the simulations of the recent past. The core period of the evaluation is from 1980 to 1999 but long-term trends are compared for an extended period (1960–2004). Comparisons of polar high-latitude temperatures show that most CCMs have only small biases in the Northern Hemisphere in winter and spring, but …