Climate and the
Hydrological Cycle
(MO408M)
Bart van den Hurk (www.knmi.nl/~hurkvd)
IMAU (Wednesday): B614
KNMI (other days): B3.36
hurkvd@knmi.nl
Aarnout van Delden (IMAU)
Geert Jan Roelofs (IMAU)
Material
• Lecture notes
– Land processes in climate models
• Presentations
• Articles
• Accessible via blackboard and
www.knmi.nl/~hurkvd
Basic structure of course
• 3 major topics
– Land surface processes in the climate system
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how to parameterize
climate zones
Land use
Land-atmosphere interaction
– Dynamical meteorology
• Water-related feedbacks
• Zonal structure and PV
• Diagnosing diabatic processes from PV
– Clouds and aerosols
• Cloud microphysics
• Clouds, aerosol and climate
• Isotopes and the hydrological cycle
Course aims
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ability to describe and basically understand the seasonal and interannual variability of the large
scale circulation of the atmosphere and the associated transport of water vapour.
ability to describe and basically understand how atmospheric radiative processes, the energetics
of the water cycle and large scale planetary waves determine the seasonal cycle of temperature
and wind-jets.
understand the physical (radiative and thermodynamic) aspects of aerosol, clouds and land
surface processes
acquire knowledge on microphysical and chemical properties of aerosol and clouds, and
understand their role in aerosol direct and indirect climate effects
understand the physical principles of processes, interactions and feedbacks at the land surface –
climate interface
have an overview of key diagnostics of land-atmosphere interaction
demonstrate a broad insight in how the different aspects of the hydrological cycle are related and
interact
understand how the hydrological cycle affects and is affected by climate and climate change
having explored and understand scientific literature on a subject associated with aerosol, clouds,
water cycle, land surface processes and climate
understand and manipulate a conceptual model of land-atmosphere interaction
technically process records of observations and model output of land surface variables
formulate a simple hypothesis related to land surface processes, evaluate observations and/or
model output relevant for this hypothesis, and report on the results and conclusions from this
evaluation.
Examination
Three projects (each 30%)
– Conceptual land-atm interaction model
– Exploring ERA-interim
– Essay on clouds/aerosols
One presentation on either topic (10%)
Presentation + 3 project reports are
evaluated  one final grade
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Schedule
6: introduction land and dynamics
Bart van den Hurk
7: introduction clouds
Aarnout van Delden
8: land parameterization
Geert Jan Roelofs
9: land use change
10: land-atmosphere interaction
11: no lecture
12: land-atmosphere interaction + introduction to land exercise
13: intrduction dynamics and water-related feedbacks
14: zonal characteristics and potential vorticity
15: zonal characteristics and potential vorticity
16: deadline essay on land exercise
17: interaction dynamics/water/radiation
18: presentations land exercise
19: interaction dynamics/water/radiation
20: cloud microphysics
21: cloud microphysics
22: aerosols, clouds and climate
23: aerosol chemistry
24: presentation dyn exercise
25: isotopes and hydrological cycle
26: presentation cloud exercise
Evaluation criteria
• Main criterion is the physical rationale of the essay
– Is it well structured (intro, questions, material, results,
conclusions)
– Is the physical hypothesis well related to the analysis?
• Marks
– 10: publishable
– 9: innovative
– 8: good set-up and rationale, no inconsistencies
– 7: fair set-up and rationale
– 6: data are used and described but clarity is limited
– 5: analysis not compatible with hypothesis
– 4: physical inconsistencies
• Secondary criteria are used for round-off (language, references,
readability, clarity of figures)
Registration
• Please register at
– Bureau Onderwijs Zaken (BOZ),
Minnaertbuilding Rm 119
– Also non-MSc, non-Utrecht participants!