Footprint modelling via LES for the LITFASS-2003 measuring campaign
Responsible: Farah Kanani
Project type: Diplomarbeit (equivalent to master thesis)
Duration: 19/10/2009-18/10/2010

In heterogeneous terrain, the measurement of turbulent fluxes involves several difficulties. The flux that is measured at a certain sensor point is not produced directly beneath the sensor, but is rather produced in areas upwind of the sensor. Therefor, the areas of influence on a flux measurement have to be determined to diagnose the representativeness of a measurement. The area of influence is called "footprint" of a measurement.

In this thesis footprints shall be determined for the measuring sites of the LITFASS-2003 measuring campaign using the parallelized LES-model PALM with an embedded Lagrangian particle model. Particles are released into the flow, moving by advection and dissipation, and are registered once intersecting with a given measuring height. With the knowledge of the particles' origin the area of influence on the measurement can be determined. Modelling footprints in heterogeneous terrain requires a large number of particles to ensure for sufficient footprint statistics. The main objective of this thesis is to determine wether or not the available computational resources meet this requirement for modelling footprints in heterogeneous terrain.

Download: Full thesis​