3. Stability

Determining Stability » Potential Instability Factors that Influence Weather Effects

Factors that Influence Weather Effects

The kind of weather that actually occurs depends on a variety of factors, such as the following:

  • The amount of lifting beyond that which is just sufficient to start condensation
  • The steepness of the wet-bulb temperature lapse rate
  • The degree of stability of the adjacent layers
  • The speed and spatial uniformity of the lifting

For many practical purposes there may be little difference in the clouds and weather that result from lifting a shallow potentially stable layer as compared to those from lifting a shallow potentially unstable layer. Therefore, there may be instances of potential instability in which the "instability" aspect is of trivial significance.