Diurnal variation of summer precipitation modulated by air pollution: observational evidences in the Beijing metropolitan area

Studying precipitation diurnal variation characteristics is crucial to better understand their formation mechanism. Moreover, it is fundamental in assessing regional climate variability and to validate the effectiveness of cloud and precipitation parameterization schemes in weather and climate models. Based on observational data from 2008 to 2017, this manuscript objective is to assess the aerosol effects on summer precipitation on an hourly-scale diurnal variation basis in the Beijing metropolitan area. The results put in evidence that the precipitation frequency and duration on polluted days were 25.0% and 14.8% lower with respect to clean days. No significant differences were observed in total daily accumulated rainfall between clear and polluted days. While heavy precipitation mean intensity on polluted days increased by 13.5%, which is potentially linked with aerosol microphysical effects. Note that precipitation occurs earlier on polluted days, with peak time of 1 similar to 2-hour in advance compared with clean days over the urban areas of Beijing, which may be primarily ascribed to the influence of advanced turning local circulation of mountain-valley breezes and urban heat island circulation due to aerosol-radiation effects.