Study on development and application of a regional PBL numerical model

A regional scale (a few km to a few hundred km, minutes to days) planetary boundary layer (PBL) numerical model (RPBLM) has been successfully developed to simulate precisely the boundary-layer three-dimensional characteristics. The RPBLM model with a high-resolution non-hydrostatic E - epsilon turbulence closure scheme has been applied to diagnose and prognosticate the PBL characteristics over a complex underlying surface in the Hong Kong area of 60 km x 48 km. It is shown that the RPBLM model can be used to simulate the PBL characteristics including wind, temperature, water vapour and turbulence over such a complex underlying surface and that the simulated result is reasonably in agreement with observations.