High-Resolution Large-Eddy Simulations of Flow in a Steep Alpine Valley. Part II: Flow Structure and Heat Budgets

Abstract

This paper analyzes the three-dimensional flow structure and the heat budget in a typical medium-sized and steep Alpine valley—the Riviera Valley in southern Switzerland. Aircraft measurements from the Mesoscale Alpine Programme (MAP)-Riviera field campaign reveal a very pronounced valley-wind system, including a strong curvature-induced secondary circulation in the southern valley entrance region. Accompanying radio soundings show that the growth of a well-mixed layer is suppressed, even under convective conditions. Our analyses are based on the MAP-Riviera measurement data and the output of high-resolution large-eddy simulations using the Advanced Regional Prediction System (ARPS). Three sunny days of the measurement campaign are simulated. Using horizontal grid spacings of 350 and 150 m (with a vertical spacing as fine as 20 m), the model reproduces the observed flow features very well. The ARPS output data are then used to calculate the components of the heat budget of the valley atmosphere, first in profiles over the valley base and then as averages over almost the entire valley volume. The analysis shows that the suppressed growth of the well-mixed layer is due to the combined effect of cold-air advection in the along-valley direction and subsidence of warm air from the free atmosphere aloft. It is further influenced by the local cross-valley circulation. This had already been hypothesized on the basis of measurement data and is now confirmed through a numerical model. Averaged over the entire valley, subsidence turns out to be one of the main heating sources of the valley atmosphere and is of comparable magnitude to turbulent heat flux divergence. On the mornings of two out of the three simulation days, this subsidence is even identified as the only major heating source and thus appears to be an important driving mechanism for the onset of thermally driven upvalley winds.