A roughness sublayer wind profile above a non-uniform surface

Abstract

In atmospheric models for different scales the underlying surface consists of patches of bare soil and plant communities with different morphological parameters. Experimental evidence indicates that there is a significant departure of the wind profile above a vegetative surface from that predicted by the logarithmic relationship, which gives values that are greater than those observed. This situation can seriously disturb the physical picture concerning the transfers of momentum, heat and water vapour from the surface into the atmosphere. The intention of this paper is to generalise the calculation of exchange of momentum between the atmosphere and a non-homogenous vegetative surface, and to derive a general equation for the wind speed profile in a roughness sublayer under neutral conditions. Furthermore, these results are extended to non-neutral cases. The suggested expression for the wind profile is compared with some earlier approaches and the observations obtained above a broad range of plant communities.