The Year of Polar Prediction in the Southern Hemisphere (YOPP-SH)

The Year of Polar Prediction in the Southern Hemisphere (YOPP-SH) had a Special Observing Period (SOP) that ran from November 16, 2018 to February 15, 2019, a period chosen to span the austral warm season months of greatest operational activity in the Antarctic. Some 2200 additional radiosondes were launched during the 3-month SOP, roughly doubling the routine program, and the network of drifting buoys in the Southern Ocean was enhanced. An evaluation of global model forecasts during the SOP and using its data has confirmed that extratropical Southern Hemisphere forecast skill lags behind that in the Northern Hemisphere with the contrast being greatest between the southern and northern polar regions. Reflecting the application of the SOP data, early results from observing system experiments show that the additional radiosondes

Interfaces für Energiemanagement

Zsfassung in engl. SpracheFür die Anpassung von Erzeugung und Verbrauch im elektrischen Energieversorgungssystem (Energiemanagement) bedarf es aufgrund des stetig steigenden Energiebedarfs und dem vermehrten Einsatz von Erzeugung aus erneuerbaren Energiequellen neuer flexibler Lösungen. Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es, Möglichkeiten aufzuzeigen, das Energiemanagement mit Hilfe der Beeinflussung von Verbrauchern effizient zu gestalten.Hierzu bedarf es definierter Interfaces zur Anbindung von Verbrauchsprozessen an eine Automationsinfrastrukur. Verschiedene Hürden einer Teilnahme von Verbrauchern am Energiemanagent diskutiert. Aufgrund der Tatsache, dass thermische Prozesse durch ihre Trägheit die Fähigkeit besitzen, thermische Energie zu speichern, ist es sinnvoll, diese in das Energiemanagement einzubeziehen. Es wurde ein einfaches, allgemein gültiges Modell für thermische Prozesse entwickelt, welches universell anwendbar und für eine große Anzahl potentiell beeinflussbarer Verbraucher gültig ist. Für ein Demonstrationsobjekt zur Veranschaulichung einer der erarbeiteten Interfacevarianten wurde eine externe Temperaturregelung entwickelt und die Modellierung des thermischen Prozesses anhand von Simulation und Messungen verifiziert.Sowohl Simulation als auch die Messungen zeigen, dass eine positive Beeinflussung des Energiemanagements möglich ist.In order to balance the energy supply system in therms of generation and consumption, new flexible solutions are needed, because of increasing power demand and growing share of generation from renewable energie sources. This masters theses gives options to make power supply more efficient by influencing the consumer side of the energy system. To make that possible, defined interfaces are needed in order to adapt and connect consumption processes to an automation infrastructure. Different types of interfaces are presented and chances as well as problems of these options are beeing discussed. Due to the fact that inert thermal processes can store thermal energy, they can be used very efficiently for energy management purposes in the electricity grid. A simple and generaly valid concept has been developed, which can be applied to a large number of different kinds of consumption processes. For demonstrating the possibilities of interfaced loads, an external temperature regulation has been designed for an exemplary refrigerator system. This experiment verified the model on the basis of simulation and measurements, and clearly shows that effective load managment can be conducted.11

Verification of cloudiness and radiation forecasts in the greater Alpine region

The skill of ECMWF operational cloudiness and radiation forecasts is evaluated for the greater Alpine region using ground-based and satellite observations. Ground-based observations are the total cloud cover reported by SYNOP stations. The satellite data we use is the downward surface solar radiation and the top of the atmosphere (TOA) reflected solar radiation from the EUMETSAT Climate Monitoring Satellite Application Facility (CM SAF). A cloud type which is difficult to represent correctly in numerical weather prediction models and which has particular relevance in central Europe is wintertime low stratus. This evaluation shows how it affects forecast skill in mountain areas compared to flat terrain. Results indicate higher skill of the cloud forecast in the Alps compared to the surrounding lowlands throughout the year, with the largest differences in skill occurring in late autumn and early winter. There is also a marked asymmetry in skill between the northern and southern lowlands adjacent to the Alps, which can be attributed to the higher prevalence of low stratus in northern areas. Comparison with other regions shows that cloud forecast skill in Europe is generally high, and that there are large areas of low skill dominated by marine stratus and stratocumulus

Reflexionen über die Note, welche von des Herrn Hof- und Staatskanzlers Fürsten von Kaunitz-Rietberg Durchlaucht dem päpstlichen Herrn Nunzius Garamppi auf dessen Billet vom 12ten Dezembers 1781 die Oesterreichischen Verordnungen in geistlichen Sachen betreffend, den 19ten des nämlichen Monats und Jahres zugestellet worden ist : Ein Handbuch für Priester, und Staatsmänner

Von dem Verfasser der Grundsätze zur Feststellung und Aufrechthaltung der politischen und kirchlichen Macht in katholischen StaatenVerf. ermittelt in: Holzmann/Bohatt

Evaluation of ensemble streamflow predictions in Europe

SummaryIn operational hydrological forecasting systems, improvements are directly related to the continuous monitoring of the forecast performance. An efficient evaluation framework must be able to spot issues and limitations and provide feedback to the system developers. In regional systems, the expertise of analysts on duty is a major component of the daily evaluation. On the other hand, large scale systems need to be complemented with semi-automated tools to evaluate the quality of forecasts equitably in every part of their domain.This article presents the current status of the monitoring and evaluation framework of the European Flood Awareness System (EFAS). For each grid point of the European river network, 10-day ensemble streamflow predictions are evaluated against a reference simulation which uses observed meteorological fields as input to a calibrated hydrological model. Performance scores are displayed over different regions, forecast lead times, basin sizes, as well as in time, considering average scores for moving 12-month windows of forecasts. Skilful predictions are found in medium to large rivers over the whole 10-day range. On average, performance drops significantly in river basins with upstream area smaller than 300km2, partly due to underestimation of the runoff in mountain areas. Model limitations and recommendations to improve the evaluation framework are discussed in the final section

Sizing of Metallic Nanoparticles Confined to a Microfluidic Film Applying Dark-Field Particle Tracking

We present Brownian motion-based sizing of individual submicron and nanoparticles in liquid samples. The advantage of our approach is that particles can freely diffuse in a 10 μm thin liquid film and are therefore always within the focal depth of a low numerical aperture objective. Particles are visualized with dark-field microscopy, and the resulting diffraction-limited spots are tracked over a wide field of view of several hundred micrometers. Consequently, it is ascertained that long 2D trajectories are acquired, which leads to significantly increased particle sizing precision. The hydrodynamic diameters of metal particles with nominal sizes ranging from 70 to 200 nm in aqueous solution were determined by tracking for up to 2 min, and it was investigated if the diffusion characteristics were influenced by the proximity of substrates. This was not the case, and the estimated diameters were in good agreement with the values obtained by electron microscopy, thus validating the particle sizing principle. Furthermore, we measured a sample mixture to demonstrate the distinction of close particle sizes and performed the conjugation of a model protein (BSA) on the nanoparticle surface. An average increase in the radius of 9 nm was determined, which corresponds to the size of the BSA protein