Observational analysis demonstrates that sub-cloud evaporation alters precipitation isotopes in tropical island climates, highlighting key uncertainties for atmospheric simulation models.
Sub-cloud evaporation changes the isotopic composition of precipitation, which greatly reduces the reliability of precipitation isotopic data as precipitation simulation data. This study employed the precipitation isotope datasets of Haikou in northern Hainan Island from June 2020 to February 2024 to quantitatively study the influence of sub-cloud evaporation on precipitation isotopes in tropical islands. Due to the sub-cloud evaporation, the slope of the local meteoric water line (LMWL: δ2H = 8.33δ18O + 14.33) is lower than the average slope of the theoretical LMWL (8.48). The average value of the residual ratios of raindrop after evaporation (f) is 86%. The complex and unstable sources of water vapor result in no obvious seasonal variations in the atmospheric humidity, which in turn leads to no obvious seasonal variations in Δd and f. The humid and hot environmental conditions reduced the impact of sub-cloud evaporation on precipitation isotopes. The two main uncertainties in the simulation of below-cloud evaporation are the influence of recycled water vapor on precipitation isotopes and the Stewart model’s assumption that raindrops at the cloud base achieve isotopic equilibrium with the surrounding water vapor, as it is difficult to realize. The results of this study are of great significance for improving the accuracy of precipitation simulation in tropical monsoon islands.
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Chen et al. (2025) studied this question.
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