Design of intermittent rainfall-pattern for structures with gridded data: Validation and implementation. (January 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Das, Sneha; Narula, Pankaj; Sarkar, Kaustav
• Is Part Of: Journal of building engineering. Volume 27(2020)
• Publication Date: 2020-01
• Subjects: Cyclic wetting -- Intermittent rainfall Grid-to-point comparison -- Gridded data -- Design scenario -- Tropical exposure; Building -- Periodicals; 690.05
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jobe.2019.100939
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2352-7102

Abstract

Abstract: The cyclic wetting of structures caused by intermittent rainfall is known to be detrimental to their performance. While modelling of this exposure scenario is critical towards the rational design of structures, it is constrained due to the non-availability of reliable data. This paper evaluates the potential of gridded datasets, which have inherent spatial and temporal continuity, vis-à-vis station data for this purpose. A two-stage grid-to-point comparison algorithm and a novel index have been developed to quantify the degree of conformity. The scope of this study entails instances of five stations, each pertaining to a distinct climatic zone of India, and their associated grids of 1° × 1°, 0.5° × 0.5°, and 0.25° × 0.25° (lat./long.) resolution. Results reveal close conformity of the 0.25° × 0.25° and 0.5° × 0.5° datasets with the station records. These datasets have been subsequently used to synthesize rainfall patterns of varying severity with a two-state Markov's model. The study concludes with an estimation of typical durations of rainfall exposure that can be combined with the designed patterns of intermittent rainfall to aid hygrothermal studies. Highlights: An algorithm is proposed for the grid-to-point comparison of gridded rainfall data. A novel index has been formulated to estimate the quality of gridded rainfall data. The dataset of 100 km grid size is outperformed by those of 50 km and 25 km. Intermittent rainfall patterns have been designed for five locations in India.