Abstract
This is the second of two companion papers that describe the development and application of a unique set of kinetic energy budget equations which account for meso-synoptic scale interactions. This paper applies the set of equations and data discussed in the first paper to examine the influence of organized deep convective activity on larger scale flow during AVE/SESAME I, 10–11 April 1979. Kinetic energy budget results are presented for five areas: the total analysis area; the whole convection area which is fixed and contains most of the convective activity during the 24-h period; and three subareas, one containing the most intense convection (CBI), one containing weaker convection downwind of CB1 (CB2), and one containing essentially no convection downwind of CB2 (NC).
Scale interactions arise through the differences between the total SESAME dataset and that based on only the large-scale NWS data (see paper I). These differences are referred to as the δ-scale. The most energetically- active areas are those containing an ensemble of convective elements. In most cases, large-scale processes dominate; however, scale-interaction processes are important in the generation and dissipation terms throughout the period and in the horizontal transport term after intense convection is occurring. Furthermore, the significant scale-interaction effects generally occur in the upper troposphere (400–100 mb) in the vicinity of convective activity.
Results show that scale-interaction processes are causing significant generation of kinetic energy in CB1 and CB2, as well as dissipation of energy to subgrid scales. The major interaction horizontal advection term is contributing to export of energy away from CB1 and into CB2. The NC area is characterized by much weaker scale-interaction processes.
Analyses of the 400–100 mb layer distributions for the major interaction terms show that thunderstorms appear to be responsible for significant changes in δ-scale wind and height components which, in concert with preexisting large-scale wind and mass fields, are causing the observed interaction effects.
