How to select landunit types to represent RURAL

[Yuan Sun]

Hi all,

I am calculating landunit level variables where I am not sure how to represent rural areas.

I searched previous talks and found in the 'Calculate urban energy flux from its pft-level output', rural is represented by 'bare soil+veg+crop'.

However, I checked the CLM5 with only veg and crop landunit types. Could I use these two to calculate rural outputs by fraction-weighted veg and crop?

Thanks,
Yuan

 

[oleson]

Yes, you could use veg and crop landunits weights/types to calculate rural variables. Bare soil is included as one of the pfts (pft "0"; see Table 2.2.1 in the technical note), so bare soil is included in the average for the vegetated landunit.
There are numerous rural variables in the history output. some of these are not output by default so you would need to request them through your user_nl_clm. They have "_R" at the end of the variable name. E.g., 'TG_R','WBT_R','WBA_R','TSA_R','TREFMXAV_R','TREFMNAV_R','THIP_R','THIC_R','TEQ_R','SWMP80_R','SWMP65_R','SWBGT_R','APPAR_TEMP_R','DISCOIS_R','DISCOI_R','EFLX_LH_TOT_R','EPT_R','FGR_R','FIRA_R','FIRE_R','FSA_R','FSH_R','FSM_R','HIA_R','HUMIDEX_R','QRUNOFF_R','RH2M_R', etc.

 

[Yuan Sun]

Hi Keith,

Thanks for your suggestions. I found that 'TG_R' only has values when the index landunits are 1 and 2, which indeed refers to vege and crop.

When calculating UHI in TBD, HD and MD, I previously selected landunit level outputs for both urban and rural. But for the rural, I may not need landunit outputs.

I calculate CUHI_tbd = TSA_U (within tbd) - TSA_R

Best,
Yuan

 

[oleson]

That sounds right.