Cloud Base Height Retrievals#

This example shows how to calculate the cloud base heights using the sobel edge detection method. This can be used for vertical radar and lidar data.

Author: Adam Theisen

SGP Ceilometer with Lidar-Calculated CBH Overplotted, SGP Ceilometer with CBH Overplotted
Average difference between ceilomter and sobel heights  84.37419

from arm_test_data import DATASETS
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import act
import numpy as np

# Read Ceilometer data for an example
filename_ceil = DATASETS.fetch('sgpceilC1.b1.20190101.000000.nc')
ds = act.io.arm.read_arm_netcdf(filename_ceil)

ds = act.retrievals.cbh.generic_sobel_cbh(
    ds, variable='backscatter', height_dim='range', var_thresh=1000.0, fill_na=0.0
)

# Plot the cloud base height data
display = act.plotting.TimeSeriesDisplay(ds, subplot_shape=(1, 2), figsize=(16, 6))
display.plot('backscatter', subplot_index=(0, 0))
title = 'SGP Ceilometer with Lidar-Calculated CBH Overplotted'
display.plot('first_cbh', subplot_index=(0, 0), color='k', set_title=title)

display.plot('backscatter', subplot_index=(0, 1))
title = 'SGP Ceilometer with CBH Overplotted'
display.plot('cbh_sobel_backscatter', color='k', subplot_index=(0, 1), set_title=title)

diff = ds['first_cbh'].values - ds['cbh_sobel_backscatter'].values

print("Average difference between ceilomter and sobel heights ", np.nanmean(diff))

ds.close()
plt.show()

Total running time of the script: (0 minutes 4.619 seconds)

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