Accuracy of precipitable water vapor of ERA5 and MERRA-2 in Xinjiang
Atmospheric precipitable water vapor(PWV)is a key parameter to study and monitor weather chan-ges.According to the characteristics of complex terrain,harsh climate environment and insufficient water vapor sampling rate in Xinjiang,the accuracy of the PWV data provided by the latest ERA5 and MERRA-2 atmos-pheric reanalysis data is analyzed,with the PWV(GNSS-PWV)from the data of 11 GNSS stations in Xinjiang in 2018 as the reference value.After verifying the accuracy with the sounding station PWV data,the accuracy of ERA5 and MERRA-2 PWV in Xinjiang is evaluated.The temporal and spatial variation characteristics of the PWV bias(Bias),root mean square error(RMSE)of the two types of analysis data and the diurnal anomaly var-iation are analyzed.The results show that:(1)The annual mean Bias of ERA5 and MERRA-2 in Xinjiang are-0.97 and-1.20 mm.The annual mean RMSE are 1.81 and 2.11 mm.The accuracy PWV in the two kinds of analysis is better.ERA5 PWV is slightly more accurate than MERRA-2 PWV.(2)The PWV accuracy of both analysis data has obvious seasonal variation,generally low in summer and high in winter.(3)In terms of the di-urnal variation of PWV,the two analysis data show high consistency with GNSS-PWV,indicating better diurnal variation of PWV in Xinjiang.Therefore,the two reanalysis data have high accuracy and stability in the PWV of Xinjiang,and is an important data source to study the water vapor change in Xinjiang.