Perturbation Solution for Four-Stream Infrared Radiative Transfer Perturbation Solution for Four-Stream Infrared Radiative Transfer

Abstract A four-stream solution of the longwave radiative transfer is proposed. It is based on the exact perturbation method utilizing the absorption approximation equation as the zero-order solution. Scattering is handled by the first-order perturbation equation. The two- and four-stream approximations are compared both offline and using data from CALIPSO’s dual-wavelength lidar.