Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28

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Atmospheric Research
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/atmos

Influence of land-use misrepresentation on the accuracy of WRF

wind estimates: Evaluation of GLCC and CORINE land-use maps
in southern Spain
F.J. Santos-Alamillos a,b, D. Pozo-Vázquez a,⁎, J.A. Ruiz-Arias a,c, J. Tovar-Pescador a
a
Physics Department, University of Jaén, Spain
b
Center for Wind Energy Research (Forwind), University of Oldenburg, Germany
c
National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), Boulder, CO, United States

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this work, we evaluate the influence of land-use representation accuracy on the reliability of
Received 26 March 2014 wind speed and direction estimates derived from the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF)
Received in revised form 11 December 2014 model. To this end, the 100-m spatial resolution Coordination of Information on the Environment
Accepted 11 January 2015 (CORINE) land-use dataset was implemented as static geographic data in WRF. Next, a set of one-
Available online 28 January 2015
year long simulations at 1-km spatial resolution was conducted using both the CORINE and Global
Land Cover Characterization (GLCC) land-use datasets, the latter the default in WRF. The
Keywords: simulations were conducted for three locations in southern Spain, and were characterized by
Wind evaluation variable land-use composition and topography. At these locations, wind speed and direction
Land cover
estimates were compared against observations at different measurement elevations. Results
GLCC
showed that the selection of land-use database has a major influence on wind estimate bias. The
WRF
CORINE effect on the wind direction distribution is also significant, whereas that on the standard deviation
is much weaker. CORINE provided a more reliable land-use representation than GLCC.
Nevertheless, as a consequence of the interpolation procedure used for land use in the domain
setup, this representation did not necessarily translate to a superior roughness length, thereby
affecting wind speed and direction estimates. This was particularly so for areas of high spatial
variability in land-use categories. In such areas, the misrepresentation of land use may result in
large wind speed estimation errors.
© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction (a few minutes) resolutions. As a consequence, NWP models

Numerical weather prediction (NWP) models are con-
sidered the only tool able to provide wind field estimates at
any location and elevation above ground level. These models
resolve regional and local circulation patterns and their
coupling with surface features based on dynamical down-
scaling techniques, thereby providing wind estimates over
large regions at high spatial (a few kilometers) and temporal
⁎ Corresponding author at: Physics Department, University of Jaén, Campus
las Lagunillas E23071 Jaén, Spain.
E-mail address: dpozo@ujaen.es (D. Pozo-Vázquez).
have become an essential tool in wind energy applications
(Lavagnini et al., 2006; Zagar et al., 2006; Byrkjedal and
Berge, 2008; Bossavy et al., 2013; Carvalho et al., 2012, 2014)
and air quality modeling (Davies et al., 2007; Cheng and
Daewon, 2008; Hernández-Ceballos et al., 2013; Tao et al.,
2013).
The accuracy of surface wind speed and direction estimates
based on NWP models mainly depends on how three issues are
addressed. First, proper selection of the model physical config-
uration (mainly of planetary boundary layer PBL parameteriza-
tion) is needed (Borge et al., 2008; Jiménez and Dudhia, 2012;
Santos-Alamillos et al., 2013). Second, adequate representation

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2015.01.006
0169-8095/© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
18 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28
of topography, which depends on the spatial resolution used in
model setup, is essential (Carvalho et al., 2012; Santos-Alamillos
et al., 2013). Third, satisfactory representation of surface terrain
properties, particularly roughness length, is a key issue (Lo and
Quattrochi, 2003; Civerolo et al., 2005; Lam et al., 2006; Sertel
et al., 2009). In particular, roughness length affects the intensity
of mechanical turbulence and fluxes above the surface (Tao
et al., 2013), and thereby wind speed. This influence is
especially important for land-cover categories associated
with large roughness length values, such as urban and
forest lands. Therefore, accurate representation of such
categories and their spatial variability is important to
obtain reliable regional wind field estimates, particularly
for surface winds.
Surface terrain properties are usually calculated by land
surface parameterization schemes within NWP models, based
on seasonal tabulated values associated with different land-use
categories. Thus, NWP models include land-use category maps
derived from remote sensing land-cover products (Pielke et al.,
1999; Schweiger et al., 2005) to assign corresponding values to
land surface properties. This procedure to derive land proper-
ties presents two problems regarding accurate wind estimates.
The first is related to land-use spatial variability. Typically,
spatial resolutions used in NWP model integrations to derive
wind are larger than 1 km. Land-cover databases used in these
models have similar spatial resolutions. Nevertheless, since the
spatial variability of land cover can occur on scales less than this
resolution, the use of 1-km land use categories can lead to
considerable errors in surface properties. This translates to poor
representation of surface terrain properties, affecting meso-
scale circulations (Hartmann, 1994; Chen and Dudhia, 2001;
Weaver and Avissar, 2001; Yang, 2004). The second problem is
related to the time at which land-use data were compiled.
Land-use changes continuously with time as a result of human
and natural processes such as urbanization, deforestation,
desertification, and natural disasters. Therefore, a land-use
database can become rapidly outdated, causing misrepresen-
tation of land use (Sertel et al., 2009) and corresponding effects
on wind estimates.
Few works in the literature have investigated the effect of
accuracy of land-cover property representation on model
performance, particularly for wind estimates. For the Iberian
Peninsula, Pineda et al. (2004) implemented a new land-use
map for the Fifth-Generation NCAR/Penn State Mesoscale
Model (MM5) (Grell et al., 1994), based on the Coordination
of Information on the Environment (CORINE) Land Cover (CLC)
2000 (EEA, 2000) developed by the European Environment
Agency (EEA). This dataset is available to all countries of the
European Union (EU) at 100-m spatial resolution. Results have
shown slight improvement in reliability of surface wind
estimates using CLC.
Similarly, Sertel et al. (2009) analyzed the influence of
using different land-cover maps on surface temperature simu-
lated by the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model
(Skamarock et al., 2008). These authors also evaluated two
different land-cover maps, the default 24-category GLCC map
(Loveland et al., 2000) implemented in WRF, and a new Landsat-
derived land-cover dataset from 2001 to 2005 Landsat ETM+
images of a 30-m spatial resolution. They found significant errors
in temperature estimates, owing to changes in evaluated land-
cover maps, especially of urban areas.
Tao et al. (2013) evaluated the influence of three different
land-cover datasets on several meteorological WRF estimates
for the USA. These datasets were from the U.S. Geological
Survey (USGS; Loveland et al., 2000) and University of
Maryland (UMD; Hansen et al., 2000), which are based on the
Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR), and
from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer
(MODIS; Friedl et al., 2002). With respect to surface wind
speed, these authors found a notable increase/decrease of
average surface wind when land-cover categories associated
with large/small roughness length values were replaced by
other land-use categories associated with smaller/larger
roughness length values. In particular, the authors found that
UMD and MODIS gave stronger surface wind than GLCC (taken
as a reference) for southern Texas, but the opposite was
evidenced in southern Wyoming.
Finally, in a more recent study, De Meij and Vinuesa (2014)
evaluated the impact of using high-resolution Shuttle Radar
Topography Mission (SRTM) topography data together with
100-m spatial resolution CLC data on WRF-simulated meteo-
rological variables, surface wind speed, temperature, and
precipitation in the Lombardy region of Italy. With respect to
surface wind speed, the authors reported an average wind
speed reduction between 0.1 and 0.4 ms−1 as a consequence of
urban land misrepresentation.
The aim of the present work is to analyze the specific effect
of land-use data representation accuracy on wind speed and
direction estimates derived from the WRF model. This objective
is achieved in two steps. First, a new and updated land-cover
map with very high spatial resolution (100-m) from CLC was
implemented as the geographic source in WRF. This land-cover
map is regarded as the reference for Europe (EEA, 2000) and is
expected to provide more reliable land-use description than
the default GLCC land-use maps in WRF. Second, a set of
experiments were conducted with WRF using both land-use
datasets. The experiments were at 1-km spatial resolution
through the year 2009. Corresponding modeled hourly wind
speed and direction estimates were evaluated based on data
from three masts in southern Spain. Areas of the masts are
characterized by various land-use and topographic features.
One mast provided wind speed at different hub altitudes. Since
topography and land-use representation play a major role in
wind speed and direction variability, results were examined in
light of the topographic characteristics and roughness length
derived from both GLCC and CLC.
This paper is organized as follows. Section 2 details the
data and methodology. This includes a data description,
parameters for characterizing topography and terrain prop-
erties, the procedure used to implement the CORINE land-
cover map as the geographic source in WRF, and WRF setup
and evaluation parameters. Section 3 treats the results.
Finally, principal conclusions are presented in Section 4.
2. Methods and data
2.1. Data and terrain characterization
Modeled wind speed and direction were evaluated based on
data collected at three different stations (Fig. 1) in the region of
Andalusia (southern Spain) for the year 2009. Two of these
stations, Málaga and Seville, are from the Spanish national
 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28 19

Fig. 1. Study region and location of the three wind-measuring meteorological masts. Terrain elevation is also displayed using a 90-m spatial resolution Digital Elevation
Model (DEM).

weather service (AEMET) network, and provide hourly wind
speed and direction data measured at 10 m.a.g.l. The stations
are at the airports of these two cities. The third station, Magtel,
is a mast owned by the private Spanish company Magtel, which
measured hourly wind speed and direction at 30 and 60 m.a.g.l.
A data quality control procedure based on Jiménez et al. (2010)
was executed. This procedure revealed 0.5% of AEMET and
2.76% of Magtel data to be questionable, which were therefore
removed.
A quantitative assessment of topographic features and
terrain properties in an area surrounding a station location is
a key issue for correct interpretation of evaluation results.
Following Huaxing (2008), the mean and standard deviation
of elevation (hereafter, elev and σe) were calculated as
parameters representative of the topographic complexity of
the study areas. Both parameters were derived from a 90-m
spatial resolution Digital Elevation Model (DEM) and
computed on a 1 × 1 km grid centered on each station
location (Table 1). Fig. 2a to c shows detailed elevation maps
derived from this DEM on a 20 × 20 km grid centered on
those locations. Simple inspection of this figure reveals that
areas around the three station locations have different
topographic characteristics. Málaga station is close to the
Mediterranean Sea, in an area of low elevation (20 m.a.s.l.)
and moderate topographic complexity (σe about 7.78 m).
Seville station is inland (75 km from the coast) in an area of
very low topographic complexity (σe about 3.65 m) and
mean elevation about 30 m. Finally, Magtel station is in the
northern part of the study region at relatively high elevation
(about 643 m). This location has the greatest topographic
complexity among the three analyzed (σe about 34 m).
2.2. Development of new land-use dataset for WRF, based on
CORINE
The 100-m spatial resolution CLC 2000 map (EEA, 2000)
was adapted for use in the WRF model as geographic static
data as follows. To adapt the CLC to the WRF we followed
the procedure in Pineda et al. (2004). They proposed a
reclassification of the 44 CLC categories into 24 GLCC
(WRF default) categories based on Gower metric statistics
(Gower, 1971). The Gower parameter compares annual
Normalized Vegetation Difference Index (NVDI) cycle
similarities between GLCC and CLC categories to establish
equivalences, under the assumption that surface rough-
ness length is mainly attributable to vegetation cover and
that there is good agreement between soil moisture and
vegetation presence (Pineda et al., 2004). Following the
proposed procedure, CLC categories were reclassified
according to the GLCC categories for the Iberian Peninsula.
This new reclassified CLC dataset is denoted hereafter as
CORINE. Fig. 3a, d, and g presents results of this reclassi-
fication for the areas of the three evaluation stations.
Málaga station (Fig. 3d) is in the middle of an urban area of

Table 1
Actual and modeled topographic and roughness length (RL) parameters for the evaluated stations. Actual terrain elevation (ElevDEM) and standard deviation of
elevation (σe_DEM) have been calculated following the procedure in Section 2.1. Actual roughness length (RLCORINE100) have been calculated following the
procedure detailed in Section 2.2 using the 100 m spatial resolution CORINE. Modeled terrain elevations (ElevWRF) have been extracted from the nearest cells to
the geographic coordinates of each stations using the corresponding 1-km spatial resolution domain. Finally, modeled RL for the GLCC-1 km and CORINE-1 km
experiments (RLGLCC-1 km and RLCORINE-1 km, respectively) have been calculated following the procedure detailed in Section 2.2 from the respective WRF
integrations. All parameters are expressed in meters (m).

Station ElevDEM σe_DEM ElevWRF RLCORINE100 RLGLCC-1 km RLCORINE-1 km

Málaga 20 7.8 25 0.32 0.18 0.35

Sevilla 30 3.65 29 0.18 0.15 0.14
Magtel 643 34 629 0.19 0.17 0.11
20 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28
Fig. 2. Terrain elevation maps. (a), (b) and (c) represent the reference terrain elevation maps using a 90-m spatial resolution Digital Elevation Model (DEM) for Málaga,
Seville and Magtel stations, respectively. (d), (e) and (f) present modeled terrain elevation maps using the 1-km spatial resolution domain for those stations. Terrain
elevation maps are presented in a 20 × 20 km grid box centered on each station.
about 1 million habitants and basically has an urban land
use. Seville (Fig. 3d) station is in the outskirts of the city,
and the area around the station has a notable variety of
land-use categories. Within a few km of the station
location, land uses vary from urban to irrigated cropland,
with corresponding variations in roughness length. Finally,
Magtel station (Fig. 3g) is in the northern part of the study
region, away from large population areas. Nevertheless,
there is also a notable variety of land use. Within a few km
of the station location, land-use categories vary from
mixed shrubland and cropland to deciduous broadleaf
forest.
Fig. 3b, e and h shows for the three station areas the land-
use maps used in the 1-km spatial resolution WRF experiments
configured with GLCC (these experiments are detailed in
Section 2.3 and are denoted GLCC-1 km). Analogously, Fig. 3c,
f and i shows for the three station areas the land-use map used
in the 1-km spatial resolution WRF experiments configured
with the implemented CORINE (denoted CORINE-1 km;
Section 2.3). The comparison of the various land-cover maps
in Fig. 3 reveals important features. First, GLCC categories
(central column of maps) differ considerably from those of
CORINE (left and right columns). This is particularly noticeable
for Málaga station. The GLCC-1 km land-use map does not
show urban categories in the area of this station, and most of
the area is classified as cropland. As discussed earlier, this
station is at Málaga airport, in the middle of an extremely
urbanized area. South of the station the terrain is dominated by
cropland areas, and to the north and west by urban land. The
CORINE-1 km land-use map (Fig. 3c) reasonably represents the
spatial variability of land-use categories around Málaga station
observed in Fig. 3a. Notably, the interpolation procedure
maintains the land-use categories around the mast location,
with urban areas to the north and west and cropland to the
south. Similar conclusions can be drawn for Seville station.
Notably, the GLCC-1 km land-cover map appears outdated, and
does not depict many urban and irrigated areas around the
station location (Fig. 3d and e). However, the CORINE-1 km
land-use map (Fig. 3f) reasonably represents the land-use
variability. However, some categories were lost in the interpo-
lation procedure, for instance, irrigated areas south of the
station (Fig. 3d and f). Finally, the Magtel station case presents
some additional features. The station is in a remote country
area, with no population increase in the last 50 years.
Therefore, urban areas are reasonably represented in the
GLCC-1 km land-use map (Fig. 3h). Nevertheless, the station
location has strong variability of land use (Fig. 3g). This is not
represented by that map, which shows only cropland. The
CORINE-1 km land-cover map (Fig. 3i) also fails to represent
this strong land-use variability. In particular, the area of
deciduous forest to the south of the station (Fig. 3g) is
represented as cropland in Fig. 3i. Therefore, the different
roughness length values associated with these two categories
could contribute to wind estimation error.
Results in Section 3 are discussed in light of the above
differences in land-use maps. To facilitate interpretation of the
results, spatial variability of the land-use categories around the
stations must be characterized. Since land use is a categorical
variable, the proposed parameters for the topography charac-
terization are not valid in this case. Therefore, instead of land
use, we used roughness length (hereafter denoted as RL) and
calculated its mean value in a 3 × 3 km area surrounding the
stations. The RL was calculated in a wider area than elev to
account for effects of neighbor cells. This approximation was
taken from Sertel et al. (2009). These RL values were computed
following the procedure within the Noah land surface model
(LSM) (Chen and Dudhia, 2001; Chen, 2007). This procedure
calculates monthly RL based on tabulated values that depend
on land-use categories and weighting those values by the
monthly Green Vegetation Fraction (GVF) value of a pixel. The
 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28 21

Fig. 3. Land-cover categories maps for a 20 × 20 km grid box centered on each station. For the Málaga station, (a) represents 100-m spatial resolution CORINE land-cover
map reclassified into GLCC land-cover map categories, (b) represents 1-km spatial resolution land-cover map used in the WRF integration and derived from the GLCC
land cover map and, finally, (c) represents the 1-km spatial resolution land-cover map used in the WRF integrations and derived from the CORINE 100-m land cover
map reclassified according to the GLCC categories. (d), (e) and (f) as (a), (b) and (c) but for the Seville station. (g), (h) and (i) as (a), (b) and (c) for the Magtel station.

main reason for this is because WRF is configured with this LSM
parameterization (Section 2.3); therefore, a consistent com-
parison of actual and modeled RL values could be made. For
estimation of actual RL values at each station, the CORINE land-
use and monthly GVF values obtained from the inner WRF
domain (the fourth domain, with 1-km spatial resolution;
Section 2.3) were used. It is important to mention that there is a
mismatch between the CORINE land use and monthly GVF,
because of spatial resolution. That is, there are 900 cells for the
former and 9 for the latter within the selected 3 × 3 km area.
Therefore, monthly values of RL were calculated for each 100-m
spatial resolution cell, using the corresponding CORINE land-
use category and monthly GVF values of the nearest 1-km WRF
cell. Minimum and maximum background RL values associated
22 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28

Table 2 The physical configuration was selected based on previ-

Parameters needed for the monthly roughness length estimation in ous evaluations of WRF performance in the study region
the Noah Land Surface model. In particular, minimum and maximum
background roughness lengths through the year (Z0 MIN and Z0 MAX,
(Fernández et al., 2007; Borge et al., 2008; Ruiz-Arias et al.,
respectively) for each GLCC land-use category are given. These values are 2008; Santos-Alamillos et al., 2013). Notably, the Rapid
taken from the WRF model (see VEGPARAM.TBL file). Roughness length Radiative Transfer Model scheme (Mlawer et al., 1997) was
values are expressed in meters (m). chosen for longwave radiation parameterization, and the
Land use Z0MIN Z0MAX Dudhia scheme (Dudhia, 1989) for shortwave radiation
parameterization. For the two-way nested domains (27, 9,
Urban and built-up land 0.50 0.50
Dryland cropland and pasture 0.05 0.15 and 3 km), the Kain–Fritsch scheme (Kain and Fritsch, 1993)
Irrigated cropland and pasture 0.02 0.10 was used for cumulus parameterization. For the fourth
Mixed dryland/irrigated cropland and pasture 0.05 0.15 domain, the cumulus parameterization was disabled. We
Cropland/grassland mosaic 0.05 0.14 selected the Yonsei University (Hong et al., 2006) planetary
Cropland/woodland mosaic 0.20 0.20
Grassland 0.10 0.12
boundary layer scheme for boundary layer parameterization
Shrubland 0.01 0.05 and Thompson graupel scheme (Thompson et al., 2010) for
Mixed shrubland/grassland 0.01 0.06 microphysics parameterization. Finally, the unified Noah
Savanna 0.15 0.15 LSM was used for land surface parameterization (Chen,
Deciduous broadleaf forest 0.50 0.50
2007).
Deciduous needleleaf forest 0.50 0.50
Evergreen broadleaf forest 0.50 0.50 Grid nudging toward the reanalysis was used for the
Evergreen needleleaf forest 0.50 0.50 first domain (only the 15 upper levels in the vertical).
Mixed forest 0.20 0.50 Additionally, sea surface temperature (SST) analyses were
Water bodies 0.0001 0.0001 interpolated to ocean grid points in each model domain,
Herbaceous wetland 0.20 0.20
using the NCEP version 2.0 global SST dataset (Reynolds
Wooded wetland 0.40 0.40
Barren or sparsely-vegetated land 0.01 0.01 et al., 2007). This dataset is updated daily on a 0.05° grid.
Herbaceous tundra 0.10 0.10 Initial and boundary conditions were derived from the
Wooded tundra 0.30 0.30 Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR) (Saha et al.,
Mixed tundra 0.15 0.15
2010), with 0.5° spatial resolution every 6 h. The WRF
Bare ground tundra 0.05 0.10
Snow or ice 0.001 0.001
simulations were for the entire year of 2009, splitting the
simulation period into eight-day integrations. The first day
of these integrations was used as spin up (Hahmann et al.,
with each GLCC category required in the Noah LSM were taken 2010). The simulations were saved every 10 min. Finally,
from tabulated GLCC values in WRF, and are displayed in hourly wind speed and direction values were calculated
Table 2. Once the monthly RL values were calculated for the from the 10-min outputs.
900 cells, they were spatially averaged. Finally, because the Topography, land-use and land-water mask datasets were
evaluation was done for the entire period, annual average interpolated from the GLCC dataset for the first three domains,
monthly RLs were calculated as representative values. Based on using spatial resolutions 5′, 2′, and 30″. However, for the fourth
this procedure, the modeled RL values for GLCC-1 km and domain, two different land-use cover maps were used, i.e., the
CORINE-1 km were derived directly from WRF integration GLCC land-cover dataset in WRF with spatial resolution 30″
outputs for each land-cover database. As in the case of actual RL (~1 km at study region latitudes), and the 100-m spatial
values, modeled values were spatially averaged over a 3 × 3 km resolution CORINE. These experiments are designated GLCC-
grid centered at the station location, and then temporally 1 km and CORINE-1 km, respectively.
averaged over the complete period. Both actual and modeled RL Finally, it is important to state that the work focused
values are presented in Table 1. on the influence of land-use representation on WRF wind
estimation errors. Nevertheless, other sources of errors
such as those associated with wind measurement or
2.3. WRF setup and experiments initialization/boundary conditions, were not considered
in the evaluation procedure.
WRF model v3.4 (Skamarock et al., 2008) was used
for the simulations. For each station, WRF was configured 2.4. Evaluation statistics
with four nested domains, of 27, 9, 3, and 1 km spatial
resolutions. Note that the four domains were configured Wind estimates were verified based on different statistics.
with a total of 90 × 90 grid points. For the first three For wind speed, standard deviation (STD) was used, which
domains, two-way interaction was used. For the 1-km estimates the scatter of modeled and observed wind speed
domain, one-way nesting was applied. Wind speed and values:
direction data in the fourth domain were then evaluated.
vffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
Fig. 4 shows an example of this spatial configuration for the uX
u ðmi −oi Þ
2
Magtel station. A total of 36 vertical levels were used. The u
t i
six lowest vertical levels (approximately 4, 18, 43, 64, 76, STD ¼
E
and 110 m) were used in a vertical interpolation based on
cubic splines, to accommodate horizontal wind compo-
nents at the two hub heights (30 and 60 m.a.g.l.) at Magtel where N is the number of records and m and o are modeled and
station. observed wind speeds, respectively. Next, we used mean error
 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28 23

Fig. 4. Spatial configuration for numerical simulation at Magtel station. Four domains, with 27, 9, 3 and 1 km spatial resolutions, were configured. Data from the inner
domain (1 km) were analyzed.

or bias, which quantifies the overall bias of wind speed data and 3. Results and discussion
detects model overestimation or underestimation:
X Wind speed and direction estimates based on use of the two
ðmi −oi Þ different land-use maps (GLCC-1 km and CORINE-1 km) were
i evaluated for each station and measurement elevation. Fig. 5
BIAS ¼
N presents values of bias, STD and DACC. Fig. 6 presents wind
direction distributions for observations and estimates. Modeled
Traditionally, wind direction has been evaluated using
wind time series were selected from the cell nearest the
simple graphical methods, such as wind rose plots. However,
geographic coordinates of each station. These cells gave the
these methods have limitations regarding meaningful statisti-
best agreement with actual terrain elevation, distance to the
cal characteristics, and other quantitative parameters must be
coast, and terrain morphology.
used. Recently, in Santos-Alamillos et al. (2013), we proposed
Bias values (Fig. 5a) strongly depended on the station
directional accuracy parameters based on the circular distance
databases. Málaga and Seville showed positive biases but
between two angles (Jammalamadaka and Sengupta, 2001).
Magtel negative ones. Overall, CORINE-1 km gave lower
This parameter, denoted as DACC, accounts for the percentage
bias values than GLCC-1 km. The most notable difference
of times for which the circular distance between the observed
was for Málaga, where bias was reduced from 0.52 ms − 1
and modeled wind directions is less than a threshold, chosen as
for GLCC-1 km to near zero for CORINE-1 km. This
30° here. First, we define the circular distance:
difference can be explained by the topographic and terrain
 ∘  parameter values obtained for this station (Table 1). The
Δθðα; βÞ ¼ min α−β; 360 −ðα−βÞ reference (“actual”) RL value around this station, derived
from CORINE-100 m, is 0.32. This value resulted from
where Δθ is the circular distance between angles α and β. Then,
the composition of land use around Málaga station. In
the DACC is defined as:
particular, in a 3 × 3 km area surrounding this station,
CORINE-100 produced 57% urban terrain and 43% cropland.
X 1if 0∘ ≤Δθ ≤30∘ 
i CORINE-1 km provided a similar proportion of land-use
i
0ðelseÞ categories (67% urban and 33% cropland/woodland). This
DACC ¼  100:
N gave a similar RL (0.35), slightly higher than the reference.
24 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28

Fig. 5. Result of the wind speed and direction experiments evaluation. (a) Presents the bias values for GLCC-1 km (black bars) and CORINE-1 km (gray bars) for the
different station and measuring elevations. “Mal” and “Sev” refers to the Málaga and Seville stations, respectively. “M30” and “M60” refers to the 30 and 60 meter
measurement elevations of the Magtel station. Similarly, STD and DACC values are presented in (b) and (c), respectively.

On the contrary, GLCC-1 km indicated almost 100% of land-
use as cropland, with none urban. As a consequence, RL was
considerably smaller (0.18), resulting in significant over-
estimation of wind speed. Topographic features appeared
to have less influence. Modeled elev was 25 m, whereas
the actual value derived from the DEM was 20 m. This
overestimation of elevation leads to positive bias (Santos
Alamillos et al., 2013). The bias values near zero obtained
in the CORINE-1 km experiments may have resulted from a
compensating effect of overestimation of RL and elev.
Bias values for Seville station were also positive in both
experiments, but GLCC-1 km produced slightly smaller values.
Table 1 shows that terrain elevation was well estimated by
the WRF simulation. This is a result of the low topographic
 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28 25

Fig. 6. Estimated and observed wind direction distributions. (a) Observed, (b) estimated based on the GLCC-1 km and (c) estimated based on the CORINE-1 km wind
distributions for Málaga station. (d), (e) and (f) as in a), (b) and (c) but for the Seville stations. (g), (h) and (i) as in (a), (b) and (c) but for the Magel station at 30 m.a.g.l.
measuring elevation. (j), (k) and (l) as in (a), (b) and (c) but for the Magel station at 60 m.a.g.l. measuring elevation. Values in the circle indicate the percentage of
observations; color scale at right indicates ranges of wind speed (ms−1).

complexity around the station. Differences in RL values associ-
ated with the various land-use datasets were considerably
smaller than for Málaga station, but were still significant and
responsible for differences of bias values. Based on the CORINE-
100 m (reference) database, the area surrounding the station had
a rich variety of land use (Fig 3a), composed by 28% urban land,
39% dryland cropland and pasture, 5% irrigated cropland and
pasture, and 29% cropland/woodland mosaic. This produced a
reference RL of 0.18. Both the CORINE-1 km and GLCC-1 km
datasets were unable to account for urban land and irrigated
cropland and pasture. For the remaining land uses, CORINE-1 km
overestimated the proportions of the cropland/woodland mosaic
(50%) and irrigated cropland and pasture (50%). On the contrary,
GLCC-1 km reasonably represented the dryland cropland and
pasture (33%), but overestimated cropland/woodland mosaic at
67%. As a result, RL from the GLCC-1 km was closer to the
reference value than that from CORINE-1 km. This was because
the RL associated with the dominant GLCC-1 km category was
larger than that of the CORINE-1 km dominant category.
Therefore, GLCC-1 km was better able to compensate the RL
misrepresentation associated with urban land than was CORINE-
1 km, thereby giving a more accurate RL (Table 1). Consequently,
bias associated with the GLCC-1 km database was slightly less
that of the corresponding CORINE-1 km database.
Unlike the two other stations, wind speed was under-
estimated at Magtel station for all experiments and mea-
surement elevations. The bias resulted, primarily, from
strong underestimation of elevation measurement, about
14 m (Table 1), and secondarily from the effect of vertical
interpolation of wind speed from modeled pressure levels
to each hub altitude. There were considerable differences
between the land-use databases, with CORINE-1 km giving
better performance. Bias values were between − 0.68 and
− 0.48 ms− 1 at 30 m.a.g.l, and between − 0.18 and
− 0.1 ms− 1 at 60 m.a.g.l. As expected from the reduced
effect of RL at higher elevations, bias values were about 25%
26 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28
smaller at the highest evaluation altitude. Differences
between land-use databases can be explained by the land-
use categories. In particular, CORINE-100 m classifies the
terrain around the station as follows: 13% dryland and
cropland pasture, 30% cropland/woodland mosaic, 2% grass-
land, 42% mixed shrubland/grassland, and 14% deciduous
broadleaf forest. This generated an RL of 0.19 (Table 1). The
classification from CORINE-1 km included 33% cropland/
woodland (a proportion similar to the reference case) and
9% mixed shrubland/grassland, but no deciduous forest. In
contrast, GLCC-1 km did not reproduce this land-use
variability, and output 100% cropland/woodland. Although
CORINE-1 km reproduced the land-use spatial variability
better than GLCC1-1 km around the station, the RL (0.17)
associated with the latter land-use map was nearer the
reference value than that (0.11) from the CORINE-1 km
experiment. Differences between biases associated with the
two land-use datasets appeared to stem from the compen-
sating effect between underestimation of RL and the terrain
elevation.
Regarding STD values (Fig. 5b), differences between
stations were considerably smaller than for the bias. The
largest STD values were for Málaga and Seville stations, as
might be expected from the lower measurement elevations.
Nevertheless, Seville had relatively low STD values. Differ-
ences in performance of the two land-use datasets were
negligible, except for Málaga station. This station had the
largest STD values, with 2.7 ms−1 and 3.2 ms− 1 for CORINE-
1 km and GLCC-1 km, respectively. Only for this station, STD
differences between the two databases were significant
(~ 0.5 ms− 1). Seville station had smaller STDs (2.2 ms− 1 for
GLCC-1 km vs. 2.25 ms− 1 for CORINE-1 km). Similar
conclusions can be drawn for Magtel station, which had the
smallest STD values (1.8–1.9 ms− 1 at 30 m.a.g.l. and
2.05–2.1 ms− 1 at 60 m.a.g.l.). STD differences owing to
land-use misrepresentation were negligible, as might be
expected since the influence of terrain RL on wind speed
diminished with elevation.
The ability of the two land-use databases in modeling wind
direction was assessed based on the DACC parameter (Fig. 5c)
and observation of the wind distribution (Fig. 6). The DACC
parameter varied greatly between stations and was larger for
Magtel station, as expected from the higher elevation there.
DACC values were greater for Málaga than Seville, even though
the latter station had smaller STD values. This can be explained
by the topographic features around the stations (Fig. 2). The
DACC parameter is mainly affected by the description of terrain
morphology, taking on a larger value when the wind field is
confined to a predominant direction by topographic features
(Santos-Alamillos et al., 2013). The location of Málaga station
(Fig. 2a and d), in the middle of a valley, clearly modulates the
wind direction distribution. The valley morphology seems
reasonably represented at 1-km spatial resolution (Fig. 2d). As
a result, the wind direction distribution was reasonably
reproduced (Fig. 6a to c) and DACC had relatively high values.
The Sevilla station is located in the Guadalquivir valley where
the wind field is confined (Fig. 6d). However, unlike Málaga,
the Seville station area has low topographic complexity. As a
consequence, the modeled wind field is not clearly confined to
a predominant direction, ruled by terrain morphology (Fig. 2b
and e). This gives rise to greater variability of the wind direction
distribution (Fig. 6d to f), reducing model ability to estimate
wind direction. This results in low DACC values for this station
(36%) compared to those for Málaga.
Only Málaga station showed slight differences in DACC
between the experiments with variable land use. DACC values
at this station are 48% and 51% for GLCC-1 km and CORINE-
1 km, respectively. Some additional differences were observed
in the wind direction distributions (Fig. 6b and c). These
differences may be explained by the representation of spatial
variability of the land-use categories. The experiment using
GLCC-1 km produced strong southeast winds (12 to 15 ms−1)
(Fig. 6b). These strong winds were not reproduced by CORINE-
1 km, which yielded much more accurate wind estimates
within that wind direction sector (Fig. 6c). Differences between
the two experiments can be explained by the urban land
category representation. Unlike CORINE-1 km (Fig. 3c), GLCC-
1 km (Fig. 3b) did not indicate urban land uses southeast of
Málaga station. This resulted in unrealistically high wind
speeds from the southeast as estimated by GLCC-1 km. Low
DACC values at Seville station resulted from generally poor
estimation of the wind direction distribution in both experi-
ments (Fig. 6e–f).
Finally, Magtel station had stronger agreement between
observed and modeled wind directions (Fig. 5c). Despite such
agreement, northeast winds were overpredicted in the two
experiments (Fig. 6g–i and j–l).
4. Summary and conclusions
In this work, we analyzed the sensitivity of WRF-
simulated wind speed and direction on accurate represen-
tation of land use in the WRF configuration. To this end, an
updated land-use map with very high spatial resolution
(100 m), derived from CORINE land cover, was implement-
ed as the geographic source in the WRF model. In a second
step, experiments were conducted for the year 2009 with
WRF simulations at 1-km spatial resolution, using both the
implemented CORINE (CORINE-1 km experiment) and
WRF default GLCC land-use map (GLCC-1 km experiment).
Corresponding wind speed and direction estimates were
compared against observations collected at three masts
in southern Spain. Two of these (Málaga and Seville)
provided wind speed and direction data at the surface
(10 m.a.g.l), and the third (Magtel) at two hub altitudes
(30 and 60 m.a.g.l.). Results were analyzed in light of
topographic features in the study areas and accuracy of
land-use representation around the stations.
Results showed that the GLCC land-use map is outdated for
the areas around the three stations. In particular, around the
Málaga and Seville stations, GLCC did not correctly account for
urban and irrigated land-use areas that are represented in
CORINE. CORINE-100 m and therefore CORINE-1 km appeared
to better represent actual land-use categories in the three areas.
However, the selected nearest-neighbor interpolation proce-
dure to convert land use from CORINE-100 m to the 1-km
spatial resolution grid did not always result in the most
representative land-use category on that grid. As a conse-
quence, RL was not always better estimated, which in turn
affected modeled wind speed and direction. This effect was
particularly appreciable in areas with strong spatial variability
of land use.
 F.J. Santos-Alamillos et al. / Atmospheric Research 157 (2015) 17–28
Regarding the influence of the land-use maps on wind
estimates, several conclusions can be drawn. First, the influence
of land use is mainly observed in the bias. For Málaga station,
the use of CORINE reduced bias by 0.52 ms−1. This considerable
improvement is explained by certain areas near this station
classified as urban in CORINE-1 km but as cropland in GLCC-
1 km. Since RL associated with cropland is significantly smaller
than that associated with urban land use, wind speed was
overestimated in the experiments using GLCC-1 km. For the
other stations, GLCC-1 km, although outdated, gave better wind
estimates in terms of the bias. This unexpected result is
explained by the interpolation procedure in WRF, which was
a nearest-neighbor procedure to convert the original 100-m
CORINE land-use data to the 1-km spatial resolution grid. Areas
surrounding the stations had strong variability of land use in
the original CORINE-100 m dataset. This variability was lost
during the afore-mentioned interpolation procedure. At the
Seville and Magtel stations, this interpolation resulted in the
vanishing of certain land-use categories around the stations.
When computing RL around the stations, values obtained using
the GLCC-1 km map were closer to actual (derived from
CORINE-100 m) than those from use of the CORINE-1 km land-
use map. At Magtel station, differences of bias owing to the
land-use data were greater at 30 m.a.g.l measurement height
than at 60 m.a.g.l. This may be expected, because the influence
of terrain RL on wind speed diminished with height.
Differences in standard deviation errors of wind speed
estimates associated with the use of different land-use maps
were much smaller than in the case of the bias. Only Málaga
station showed significant STD differences (2.7 ms− 1 and
3.2 ms− 1 for CORINE-1 km and GLCC-1 km, respectively).
These differences can be explained by better representation
of land-use categories around the stations, which produces
improved wind speed estimates from various directions.
This was confirmed by analysis of the wind distribution.
For the wind direction estimates, only Málaga station
showed slight differences attributable to the various land-
use databases. Notably, CORINE-1 km provided better
estimates of the wind distribution than GLCC-1 km, owing
to better representation of land-use variability around the
station. Wind speed estimates derived from GLCC-1 km
data were unrealistically high because of misrepresenta-
tion of land uses. This may be of interest in air quality
forecasting.
In future work, the authors plan to evaluate different
spatial interpolation procedures for categorical variables.
This evaluation facilitate the most representative land use in
the simulation grid from CORINE-100 m.
Acknowledgments
The Consejería de Economía, Innovación, Ciencia y Empleo of
the Junta de Andalucía (Spain) and the Ministerio de Economía y
Competitividad (MINECO, Spain) financed this research through
a postdoctoral scholarship associated with the Project P07-RNM-
02872. This work has been also supported by the Solar Radiation
and Atmosphere Modeling Group (TEP-220 Junta de Andalucía)
at the University of Jaén (Spain), and by the energy meteorology
group in ForWind (Center for Wind Energy Research), Univer-
sity of Oldenburg (Germany). The authors would like to thank
27
Magtel Renovables Corporation (Spain) and the Spanish mete-
orology agency (AEMET) for providing the observations.
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