Air–lake boundary layer and performance of a simple lake parameterization scheme over the Tibetan highlands

The Tibetan Plateau (TP) is covered by thousands of lakes which affect the regional and global heat and mass budget with important implications for the current and future climate change. However, the heat and mass budget of TP lakes and the performance of contemporary lake models over TP have not been quantified to date. We utilise 3-yr observations from Ngoring Lake, the largest lake in the Yellow River source region of TP, to investigate the typical properties of the lake–air boundary layer and to evaluate the performance of a simplified lake scheme from the Community Land Model version 4.5 (SLCLM) as one of the most popular lake parameterization schemes in atmospheric models. The strong boundary layer instability during the entire open-water period is a distinguishing feature of the air–lake exchange, similar to the situation over tropical and subtropical lakes, while contrasting to the generally stable atmospheric conditions commonly observed over ice-free temperate and boreal lakes from spring to summer. The rather simple algorithm of SLCLM demonstrated good performance in these conditions. A series of sensitivity simulations with SLCLM revealed strong shortwave solar radiation and cold air temperatures because of high altitude as the primary factors causing the boundary layer instability. The outcomes of the study (1) demonstrate the role of TP lakes as accumulators of shortwave solar radiation releasing the heat into the atmosphere during the entire open-water period; (2) justify the use of simple lake models for the Tibetan highlands, while revealing remarkable uncertainties in the estimations of the latent heat flux; (3) qualify the strong cool-skin effect on the lake surface which results from permanent negative air–lake temperature difference, and should be taken into account when interpreting remote sensing data from highland areas.