Differences in the Diurnal Variation of Precipitation Estimated by Spaceborne Radar, Passive Microwave Radiometer, and IMERG

Abstract Accurate, high‐resolution measurements of the precipitation diurnal cycle are important for understanding local variations in precipitation and the underlying processes which cause them. Combining 16 years of measurements from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Precipitation Radar (PR) and 4 years from the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Dual‐frequency Precipitation Radar (DPR) creates a 20‐year mean of near surface precipitation rate at 0.1° × 0.1°, hourly resolution from 35°N to 35°S. Similar data sets are created using the same proportions of the TRMM Microwave Imager and GPM Microwave Imager measurements, and 18 years of the Integrated Multi‐satellitE Retrievals for GPM (IMERG) precipitation product. The phase and amplitude of the diurnal variation from each data set are calculated at each grid point using a fast Fourier transform (FFT). The satellite data are validated with 14 years of hourly National Climatic Data Center rain gauge measurements over the southeast United States by applying the same FFT method. Spaceborne radar best represents the unaveraged magnitude and diurnal phase measured by the gauges in this region. Time delays are found in precipitation retrievals from passive microwave observations as well as in the IMERG product. The strengths and weaknesses of these high‐resolution data sets in determining the diurnal cycle of precipitation on a climatological scale are discussed across the tropics and subtropics. In general, when compared to PR and DPR retrievals, IMERG overestimates the global precipitation and has varying time lags, which tend to be larger and earlier over regions where organized convective systems are common.