The monitoring of tropospheric clouds and precipitation with a dual-polarization scanning lidar

摘要

Currently; the commercial use of atmospheric lidar is limited to the measurement of cloud ceiling. However, very pertinent meteorological information (such as the structure and phase of clouds and precipitation) can be obtained by recording both polarization components of the returns while operating the lidar at a fixed repetition rate and scanning its axis at a constant angular elevation speed. We present results obtained with our dual-polarization scanning lidar system during two measurement campaigns: MWISP (Mount Washington Icing Sensors Project) in April 1999, and AIRS (Alliance Icing Research Study) in the 1999-2000 winter