Introduction to the Third GEWEX Atmospheric Boundary Layer Study (GABLS3)

The atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) plays a dominant role in the exchange of energy, water vapour, trace gases and momentum between the earth’s surface and the overlying atmosphere. Consequently, the ABL is an important part of any numerical model in use for atmospheric and climate research, for operational weather forecasting, and for air - quality and wind - energy studies. For all these applications an overall representation is needed for boundary-layer turbulence and near-surface processes, as well as for vertical diffusion above the boundary layer. This representation is typically referred as the parametrization of vertical diffusion and turbulent mixing. It appears that models at various research groups and operational centres use rather different methods to represent turbulence and vertical diffusion and the reasons behind this diversity are not that easy to unravel. Most likely, this originates for historical reasons due to the outcome of various tuning exercises and to the num