Modelling and validation of the weighted mean temperature for Turkey

Water vapour is involved in many atmospheric processes. Precipitation specifically relies on the amount of precipitable water vapour ( PWV ) or the water vapour content suspended in the atmosphere. Opportunities with regard to the conversion of existing continuous Global Navigation Satellite System ( GNSS ) stations to GNSS meteorology stations ( GNSS MET ) with very little cost and acquisition of near real‐time water vapour have become popular in studies of the estimation of water vapour using GNSSs . In order to convert the GNSS observables into meteorological assets, one has to account for the extremely important conversion parameters between zenith wet delay and PWV in GNSS meteorology: T m or Q . They are estimated by analysis of radiosonde profile observations of a radiosonde station ( RS ). In this study, linear T m models were estimated from 4103 profile observations of eight Turkish RSs for the year 2011. The verification of these models was tested by using 1 year of observations at the Ankara and Istanbul RS‐GNSS stations. A T m = 48.55 + 0.80 T s model was computed for Turkey with a root mean square error of ±2.57 K. The accuracies of PWV derived from the developed T m model and the GNSS observations at the Ankara and Istanbul stations in 2013 and 2014 were found to be ±1.7 and ±1.8 mm, respectively.