ICUC12-438, updated on 21 May 2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/icuc12-438
12th International Conference on Urban Climate
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
The CROCUS Measurement Strategy
Scott Collis1, Paytsar Muradyan1, Joseph O'Brien1, Greg Anderson2, Timothy J. Wagner3, Leanne Blind-Doskocil4, Ryan Sullivan1, Matthew Tuftedal1, Sujan Pal1, Emily Zvolanek1, Robert Jackson1, Brandon Weart5, Aaron Packman6, Sun Young Park7, Abhinav Wadhwa8, Cristina Negri1, Deanna Hence13, Suzanne Beaudry9, Max Berkelhammer10, Bilal Kaludi10, and the Team CROCUS*
Scott Collis et al.
  • 1Argonne National Laboratory, Environmental Science Division, Argonne, IL, United States of America
  • 2Department of Physics, Northeastern Illinois University
  • 3Space Science and Engineering Center, University of Wisconsin–Madison
  • 4Department of Geography, Meteorology, and Environmental Science, Valparaiso University
  • 5Department of Earth, Atmosphere, and Environment, Northern Illinois University
  • 6Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Northwestern University
  • 7Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering,University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
  • 8Discovery Partners Institute, United States
  • 9Project Management Organization, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America
  • 10Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois Chicago
  • 13Department of Climate, Meteorology, and Atmospheric Science, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
  • *A full list of authors appears at the end of the abstract

The Community Research On Climate and Urban Science, CROCUS is a United States Department of Energy Urban Integrated Field Laboratory which brings a Model Driven Experiment (MODEX) approach to elucidating the underlying physics that drive urban climate systems. Chicagoland (the city itself and surrounding counties) is home to over 10 million residents and is highly Heterogeneous. Home to major transport hubs the region represents an urban to rural gradient and is bordered by the 5th largest lake on the planet.  MODEX requires a robust observational strategy. CROCUS strategy for this comprises four components: 

  • A long-term multi-node observational network, the Micronet, built around AI edge-enabled sensing nodes, fixed instrumentation, and distributed sensing networks enabled by technologies such as LoRaWAN to provide diverse earth science observations in highly heterogeneous urban settings. 
  • A series of  field campaigns bringing advanced remote sensing and sounding networks to Chicago and the surrounding region, including an advanced weather radar, combined with local ground-truthing. 
  • Curation of multi-agency open datasets.
  • Community centered data collection and characterization of affordable sensors.

As we round out two and half years in the project, eleven micronet sites have been deployed across the Chicagoland region including sites with advanced in-ground wireless sensors providing a comprehensive view of subsurface to atmosphere. The presentation will highlight several cases and showcase our first field campaign, CROCUS Urban Canyons. The Urban Canyons field campaign involved two 39 hour intensive observational periods (IOPs) over a two week period and launched 42 soundings from four locations across Chicago (a coordinated sounding network). It also brought an advanced air chemistry lab to the city and advanced LIDAR and infrared radiometric profiling.  Finally the presentation will provide an overview of the upcoming comprehensive field campaign to be held in the region in 2026/27 and highlight engagement and collaboration opportunities with the project. 

Team CROCUS:

Scott Collis scollis@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Paytsar Muradyan pmuradyan@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Joseph O'Brien obrienj@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Greg Anderson g-anderson@neiu.edu Department of Physics, Northeastern Illinois University Timothy J. Wagner tim.wagner@ssec.wisc.edu Space Science and Engineering Center, University of Wisconsin–Madison Leanne Blind-Doskocil leanne.blinddoskocil@valpo.edu Department of Geography, Meteorology, and Environmental Science Ryan Sullivan rcsullivan@anl.gov Environmental Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory Matthew Tuftedal mtuftedal@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Sujan Pal spal@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Emily Zvolanek ezvolanek@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Robert Jackson rjackson@anl.gov Environmental Science Divsion, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Brandon Weart bweart123@gmail.com Department of Earth, Atmosphere, and Environment, Northern Illinois University Aaron Packman a-packman@northwestern.edu Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Northwestern University Sun Young Park spark185@illinois.edu Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering,University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Abhinav Wadhwa awadhwa@illinois.edu Discovery Partners Institute, United States Cristina Negri cnegri@anl.gov Deanna Hence dhence@illinois.edu Department of Climate, Meteorology, and Atmospheric Science, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Suzanne Beaudry sbeaudry@anl.gov Project Management Organization, Argonne National Laboratory, United States of America Max Berkelhammer berkelha@uic.edu Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois Chicago Bilal Kaludi bkalud2@uic.edu Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois Chicago Gavin McNicol gmcnicol@uic.edu Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois Chicago Miquel Gonzalez-Meler mmeler@uic.edu Department of Biological Sciences, University of Illinois Chicago Anna E.S. Vincent anna.vincent@northwestern.edu Northwestern-Argonne Institute of Science and Engineering, Center for Water Research, Northwestern University William M. Miller wmmiller@northwestern.edu Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Northwestern University

How to cite: Collis, S., Muradyan, P., O'Brien, J., Anderson, G., Wagner, T. J., Blind-Doskocil, L., Sullivan, R., Tuftedal, M., Pal, S., Zvolanek, E., Jackson, R., Weart, B., Packman, A., Park, S. Y., Wadhwa, A., Negri, C., Hence, D., Beaudry, S., Berkelhammer, M., and Kaludi, B. and the Team CROCUS: The CROCUS Measurement Strategy, 12th International Conference on Urban Climate, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 7–11 Jul 2025, ICUC12-438, https://doi.org/10.5194/icuc12-438, 2025.

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Supplementary material file

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