Steady convection in pressure coordinates

Abstract

AbstractConservative properties of steady flow in non‐hydrostatic pressure coordinates are used to formulate theoretical models of deep convection. the pressure coordinate analysis extends the range of analytic solutions previously obtained in height coordinates, because the effect of the variation of density with height is included and is more useful for comparison with observations and the implementation of dynamical cloud models in convective parametrization schemes. Previous models are made more realistic by including a non‐constant thermodynamic lapse rate. In the case of steering‐level convection, this is shown to be a simple reinterpretation of the constant lapse rate model, while for propagating convection there are more fundamental implications; downstream propagating solutions cannot exist if the net work done by the pressure field is zero, while upstream propagation, although dynamically possible, is not observed.