BuFEX: Bunny Fence Experiment

Summary

This study is based on the hypothesis that the human induced landscape heterogeneity in southwest Australia has a significant influence on the climate in this region. We proposed that the landscape heterogeneity influences the regional climate through the alteration of atmospheric thermodynamic structure, the nature of existing secondary circulations such as sea breeze, low level jets and generating new types of mesoscale circulations. Numerical model simulations were used to examine the impact of land use on other features such as sea breeze and low level jets and also on cloud formation, with observations used to initialize and validate the numerical models. Detailed statistical analysis of satellite observed cloudiness, ground and aircraft observations of atmospheric thermodynamic structure and surface energetics was used to verify a series of proposed hypotheses on the influence of land use on the regional climate of southwest Australia. The study contributes to resolving the ongoing debate on the impact of landsacpe heterogeneity on regional climate.