Study Of Satellite Data Application In Cloud Water Resources Over The Mountains In Xinjiang

Water shortage in Xinjiang region makes conflict more acute between the local socio-economic development and ecological environment. As an important supplement to water resources, artificially enhancing precipitation becomes an effective method to ease water shortages in Xinjiang. To analyze the characteristics of spatial and temporal distribution of cloud water resources over mountainous regions, where the resources is relatively rich, can contribute to scientific and rational exploration and usage of cloud water and lower the cost of artificially enhancing precipitation during operational process.With the development of satellite technology, cloud observation has been improved greatly. The usage of satellite to retrieve cloud parameters combined with other method makes it possible to understand the macro and micro characteristics of cloud systems and identify operational regions of artificially enhancing precipitation. The multi-year average spatial distribution, seasonal and annual variation, multi-yearvariational trend of cloud parameters over Altai, Tianshan and Kunlun Mountain ranges in Xinjiang were analyzed by using CERES SSF Aqua MODIS Edition 1B/2B/2C data from the Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) of NASA's EOS from January 2003 to December 2007. The spatial and temporal variation characteristics of cloud base height and top height of different cloud types over the three mountain ranges were analyzed employing cloud profiling radar (CPR) data onboard CloudSat.The results showed that the total cloud coverage of the Kunlun Mountains was the most abundant, higher than that of Altay and Tianshan by 9.25%and 7.81%separately; ethe general multi-year average characteristics of lower layer cloud water path varying from 25g/m2 to 60g/m2 were very similar to the distribution for lower layer cloud coverage ranging from 18-30%; that is the three mountains and the area along the Tianshan Mountain were the high value area, Taklimakan Desert and the Turpan Basin were low value areas; the multi-year average values for ice water path which ranged 70～155g/m2, higher multi-year average values for ice water path occurred in the western part of Tianshan Mountain range and the middle part of Kunlun Mountain range, compared to lower values in Altay Mountainrange; the highest multi-year average values for ice cloud effective particle diameter were about 42～48μm; the highest averages for total cloud coverage over Kunlun Mountains and Altay Mountains both occurred in autumn and summer, with the values 60.42% and 52.03% respectively, however, the highest average for Tianshan Mountains,52.85%, appeared in spring;lower layer cloud coverage in autumn and winter was higher than in spring and summer; the average values for liquid water path decreased from spring to summer, and began to increase from autumn, reaching the maximum of four seasons in winter; the maximum average for ice particle effective diameter occurred in spring; different variation intervals of cloud top and base heights over the three mountain ranges existed, which had significant seasonal variation; even the cloud base and top heights for the same type clouds had significant difference; altostratus which is regarded as suitable cloud type for artificially enhancing precipitation occurred most frequent among other eight cloud types.