MeteoSwiss has set up its own monitoring network for EMER-Met, which was recently updated. It records the atmosphere above the Swiss plateau in detail, in particular in the direct vicinity of the Swiss nuclear power stations. It comprises three different monitoring systems:
- At the sites in Schaffhausen, Payerne and Grenchen, remote sensing instruments – wind profilers, radiometers and wind lidars – continually measure the wind, temperature and humidity from the ground up to several kilometres. The wind profiler is a radar that derives a vertical profile of wind speed and wind direction for all altitudes up to 8 km above ground from the reflections of the radar beam off air turbulence. The wind lidar is based on the same measuring principle, but uses an eye-safe laser beam instead of a radar beam and measures the wind up to 2 km above ground with higher accuracy. The microwave radiometers derive the humidity and temperature from the intensity of the atmosphere’s natural microwave radiation.
- High telecommunications towers reaching 100 to 250 metres above the ground and equipped with meteorological measuring devices are situated on the peaks of the Uetliberg, St. Chrischona, and Bantiger.
- At the nuclear power station sites, MeteoSwiss also measures turbulence in addition to the usual SwissMetNet parameters.
This special monitoring network is supplemented by the SwissMetNet ground-level monitoring network of MeteoSwiss, which comprehensively records the meteorological parameters close to ground level.