The diurnal cycle from observations and ERA5 in precipitation, clouds, boundary layer height, buoyancy, and surface fluxes

Diurnal variations in precipitation, clouds and other related fields are of interest for many applications. Here I analyze surface and satellite observations and ERA5 data to quantify these variations and evaluate ERA5’s performance. Results show that ERA5 captures the observed seasonal climatology of precipitation and cloud amount remarkably well. Surface observations show that warm-season precipitation exhibits a robust diurnal cycle with an amplitude of 20 to 50