FAQ (METRo)
From Documentation
Contents |
[edit] What are the performances of METRo ?
The verification of METRo have not yet been quantified. If you plan to perform an evaluation, please contact the authors of METRo so this results could be published in this wiki and used as benchmark.
[edit] Can we use METRo during summer ?
METRo is a model developped by Environment Canada to help with the maintenance of the road during the winter. It have been optimized and tested in winter condition.
Even if METRo can theorically be used during the summer, the forecast errors of METRo are greater during this season. This is mainly caused by the importance of the sun during this period. In winter, the solar flux at the surface, depending of the latitude and the model, goes up to 300 w/m², in summer it goes up to 1000 w/m². This difference, in addition of the difference in the number of hours of light, makes METRo more sensible to errors of the cloud cover during summer. This kind of error in the cloud cover, during the day, could easely lead to errors of the magnitude of 10°C for the temperature of the road.
[edit] Why is there a atmospheric forecast file in the output of METRo ?
METRo is a road temperature model. It uses as input a file with atmospherical forecast. Why does METRo produce, in addition of the roadcast file, an atmospherical forecast file different from the one given in input?
METRo performs preprocess on the atmospherical forecast: basic QA/QC operations and interpolation. Moreover, the atmospherical forecast is forced to correspond to the observation at the beginnning of the roadcast, this forcing is then relaxed in the next 4 hours.
Those operations could lead someone to think that there are inconsistencies between the roadcast and the atmospherical forecast given in input. In order to know exactly which atmospherical conditions are use by the physical module of METRo, decision have been taken to write those conditions in a file as output of METRo.
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