Diagnostic fields developed for hourly updated NOAA weather models

This document describes methods for diagnosing non-prognostic variables from explicit prognostic variables from hourly updated NOAA models. Many of these diagnostics have been developed for specific forecast applications for downstream forecast users over the years; these variables have been output from the Rapid Update Cycle (RUC) model prior to 2012, and from the Rapid Refresh (RAP) and High-Resolution Rapid Refresh (HRRR) models since 2012 and 2014, respectively. Some of these diagnostics are also being used for the RTMA-3D (experimental in 2020), as well. (RTMA Real-Time Mesoscale Analysis (Pondeca et al 2011), now being developed as a 3-d nowcast. The code for these diagnostics is developed within the Unified Post-Processor (Unipost or UPP) program, used for common NCEP modeling system output. This document serves as a reference for forecast users seeking to apply these model fields for their forecast applications.