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Stability Dependence of Canopy Flows over a Flat Larch Forest

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Abstract

The dependence on atmospheric stability of flow characteristics adjacent to a very rough surface was investigated in a larch forest in Japan. Micrometeorological measurements of three-dimensional wind velocity and air temperature were taken at two heights above the forest, namely 1.7 and 1.2 times the mean canopy height h. Under near-neutral and stable conditions, the observed turbulence statistics suggest that the flow was likely to be that of the atmospheric surface layer (ASL) at 1.7h, and of the roughness sublayer (RSL) at 1.2h. However, in turbulence spectra, canopy-induced large coherent motions appeared clearly at both heights. Even under strongly stable conditions, the large-scale motions were retained at 1.2h, whereas they were overwhelmed by small-scale motions at 1.7h. This phenomenon was probably due to the enhanced contribution of the ASL turbulence associated with nocturnal decay of the RSL depth, because the small-scale motions appeared at frequencies close to the peak frequencies of well-known ASL spectra. This result supports the relatively recent concept that canopy flow is a superimposition of coherent motions and the ASL turbulence. The large-scale motions were retained in temperature spectra over a wider region of stability compared to streamwise wind spectra, suggesting that a canopy effect extended higher up for temperature than wind. The streamwise spacing of dominant eddies according to the plane mixing-layer analogy was only valid in a narrow range at near neutral, and it was stabilised at nearly half its value under stable conditions.

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Abbreviations

h :

Mean canopy height

δ :

Mean spacing of surface roughness elements

LAI :

Single-sided leaf area index

D :

Displacement height

z :

Height above the ground

z 0 :

Aerodynamic roughness length

Z * :

RSL depth

L :

Obukhov length

ζ :

Atmospheric stability [= (z − d)/L]

U :

Local mean wind speed

\({U_{h}, U_{h}^{\prime}}\) :

U and its vertical gradient at h

U c :

Convective wind speed

u, v, w:

Instantaneous wind components in the streamwise, lateral, and vertical directions

T :

Instantaneous air temperature (°C)

u * :

Surface friction velocity \({[=\,(\overline{{u^{\prime}}w^{\prime}}^{2}+\overline{v^{\prime}w^{\prime}}^{2})^{1/4}]}\)

T * :

Temperature scale \({[=\,-\overline{w^{\prime}T^{\prime}}/u_{\ast}]}\)

σ x :

Standard deviation of arbitrary variable x

n :

Natural frequency

f :

Normalised frequency of a spectrum [= n (z − d)/U]

f p :

Normalised peak frequency

L s :

Shear length scale \({[=\,U_h/U_h^{\prime}]}\)

Λ x :

Streamwise spacing of dominant eddies for arbitrary variable x

\({\Lambda_{w}^{\prime}}\) :

Raupach’s estimation for the streamwise spacing of w

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  1. Research Institute for Humanity and Nature, 457-4 Motoyama, Kamigamo, Kita-Ku, Kyoto, 603-8047, Japan

    N. Kobayashi & T. Hiyama

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  1. N. Kobayashi
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  2. T. Hiyama
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Correspondence to N. Kobayashi.

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Kobayashi, N., Hiyama, T. Stability Dependence of Canopy Flows over a Flat Larch Forest. Boundary-Layer Meteorol 139, 97–120 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-010-9572-2

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