What would a climatologist study on a micro scale?

[TORM3NTO]

Hi everyone,

 

I'm filming a scene for a short film set in a world where climate change has advanced and the main character studies these new weather patterns occurring everyday (mostly wind and extreme heat waves). In this particular scene, he is seen finishing to write something on a white board. I learned that bell-curves is what is typically used in climate sciences but I want to be a bit more accurate in showing him writing down day-to-day differences in the climate he is studying and living in. What would a scientist/researcher be looking at, to understand the extreme weather event in Germany or in China? 

I have attached a photograph of my whiteboard with some random notes written down. The link below shows the camera angle. I need to basically show his day-to-day task studying the climate he's and I want to be as realistic as possible. Thank you all in advance for any help.

https://unsplash.com/photos/DbLlKd8u2Rw

[Prometheus]

I don't know much about this, hopefully a grown up will be along shortly, but one thing you might want to consider is that most climate models run monte carlo simulations - which just means the model is run tons of times on a computer, and a distribution of outcomes is considered. To capture this day-to-day reality it might be worth having a computer next to the whiteboard with some graph updating, like this one.

[Sensei]

As it is just entertainment, I would use a large LCD/LED display with Earth seen from cosmos with an interactive ongoing simulation showing the rising desert border as temperature rises, more frequent and larger tornadoes, changes of sea level and flooding of current low elevation lands etc. etc.

If it is already in the future, the Earth on display may have a different coastline than we know today.. The viewer will have WTF impression the first time will see the new coastline. Here you have the predictions:

https://www.google.com/search?q=coastline+simulator+global+warming

(switch to image mode)

And video:

https://www.thesun.co.uk/tech/8386736/rising-sea-levels-simulator/

e.g. Florida? What Florida? What Mar-a-Lago?

ps. I am doing a facepalm on hearing somebody buy or build something in Florida..

Edited July 23, 2021 by Sensei

[studiot]

4 hours ago, TORM3NTO said:

Hi everyone,

 

I'm filming a scene for a short film set in a world where climate change has advanced and the main character studies these new weather patterns occurring everyday (mostly wind and extreme heat waves). In this particular scene, he is seen finishing to write something on a white board. I learned that bell-curves is what is typically used in climate sciences but I want to be a bit more accurate in showing him writing down day-to-day differences in the climate he is studying and living in. What would a scientist/researcher be looking at, to understand the extreme weather event in Germany or in China? 

I have attached a photograph of my whiteboard with some random notes written down. The link below shows the camera angle. I need to basically show his day-to-day task studying the climate he's and I want to be as realistic as possible. Thank you all in advance for any help.

https://unsplash.com/photos/DbLlKd8u2Rw

I don't think gaussian(bell) curves are appropriate for the study of freak weather, for two main reasons.

Firstly whilst there is a periodic aspect to the weather it is also chaotic, in particular the large sudden variations are Cchaotic.
For the periodicity I would expect to see cyclic graphs of some sort. For the chaos I would expect to see large spike irregularly spaced along the cycles.

Here is an example from Lorenz (see later in the post)

Secondly your character would be extending known Physical Science, for which the spectrum examples I give are again not bell shaped.

 

 

4 hours ago, TORM3NTO said:

I'm filming a scene for a short film set in a world where climate change has advanced and the main character studies these new weather patterns occurring everyday (mostly wind and extreme heat waves).

OK so the study is everyday weather patterns.

Statistically (mathematically) because they are everyday, there will not be extreme heatwaves everyday.

In fact the events you refer to

4 hours ago, TORM3NTO said:

to understand the extreme weather event in Germany or in China? 

are certainly not everyday.

China had around 100 times the daily average rainfall, in the recent floods for instance.

 

So  statistically those models are already known to be wrong.

Unfortunately the correct Mathematics is less well known and so less widely and instantly recognisable.

 

The man who introduced chaos theory was Edward Lorenz (not the victorian scientist associated with relativity)

In his book he describes a very simple three variable weather model that usually follows the 'trajctory' (in time) where all three variables combine and point in the same direction.
Occasionally however they all wander off in different directions with a chaotic result.

 

 

 

On to the physical issues.

Here is the the record of a vital discovery which changed meteorological science, due to Smythe.
I only wish I had that quality of handwriting.

It shows the sunlight spectrum under different cloud conditions and pressures.
This lead to the sidcovery that high pressure does not necessarily lead to fine weather, of great importance to the annual monsoon in Asia.

 

 

Edited July 23, 2021 by studiot

[thidmir]

The equations you have on the whiteboard represent large scale changes in climate and climate dynamics. If you want equations more relevant to local changes and meteorology you might like to consider the Navier-Stokes equation based on Newton's Laws which describes the motion of a small fluid parcel in a fluid. A simple example of such an equation is 

the conservation of mass equation describing the balance between mass and the flow of mass, which you can easily look up (look for conservation of mass equation for navier-stokes equations).