thickness_hydrostatic_from_relative_humidity

metpy.calc.thickness_hydrostatic_from_relative_humidity(pressure, temperature, relative_humidity, **kwargs)[source]

Calculate the thickness of a layer given pressure, temperature and relative humidity.

Similar to thickness_hydrostatic, this thickness calculation uses the pressure, temperature, and relative humidity profiles via the hypsometric equation with virtual temperature adjustment.

\[Z_2 - Z_1 = -\frac{R_d}{g} \int_{p_1}^{p_2} T_v d\ln p,\]

which is based off of Equation 3.24 in [Hobbs2006]. Virtual temperature is calculated from the profiles of temperature and relative humidity.

This assumes a hydrostatic atmosphere.

Layer bottom and depth specified in pressure.

Parameters:
  • pressure (pint.Quantity) – Atmospheric pressure profile
  • temperature (pint.Quantity) – Atmospheric temperature profile
  • relative_humidity (pint.Quantity) – Atmospheric relative humidity profile. The relative humidity is expressed as a unitless ratio in the range [0, 1]. Can also pass a percentage if proper units are attached.
  • bottom (pint.Quantity, optional) – The bottom of the layer in pressure. Defaults to the first observation.
  • depth (pint.Quantity, optional) – The depth of the layer in hPa. Defaults to the full profile if bottom is not given, and 100 hPa if bottom is given.
Returns:

pint.Quantity – The thickness of the layer in meters.

See also

thickness_hydrostatic(), pressure_to_height_std(), virtual_temperature(), mixing_ratio_from_relative_humidity()