Potential impact of contrails on solar energy gain

Weihs, P.; Rennhofer, M.; Baumgartner, D. J.; Gadermaier, J.; Wagner, J. E.; Gehring, J. E.; Laube, W.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-1089-2015

Articles | Volume 8, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-1089-2015

© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-1089-2015

© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 8, issue 3

Research article

|

05 Mar 2015

Research article |

| 05 Mar 2015

Potential impact of contrails on solar energy gain

P. Weihs, M. Rennhofer, D. J. Baumgartner, J. Gadermaier, J. E. Wagner, J. E. Gehring, and W. Laube

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Final revised paper (published on 05 Mar 2015)
Preprint (discussion started on 29 Aug 2014)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC C2792: 'Potential impact of contrails on solar energy gain', Michal Segal-Rosenheimer, 21 Sep 2014
RC C2918: 'Potential impact of contrails on solar energy gain', Anonymous Referee #2, 27 Sep 2014
- RC C3022: 'Corrected Comment', Anonymous Referee #2, 06 Oct 2014
  - AC C3719: 'Reply to comments of reviewer 2', Philipp Weihs, 14 Nov 2014

Short summary

The effect of contrails on global shortwave radiation (sum of direct and downward diffuse solar radiation) and on solar energy gain was investigated. The results show that contrails moving between sun and observer/sensor may reduce the global radiation by up to 72%. An analysis of contrail persistence and influence of contrails on global irradiance and solar energy gain is presented. The losses in solar energy gain that were recorded may be critical under specific circumstances.