Potentiality of the SC EXCELL model in the prediction of rain attenuation

An improved version of the EXCELL rain attenuation model which, analogously to the original one, predicts attenuation through a rain cellular representation of the meteorological environment is here presented. The new model computes separately the contributions from stratiform and convective rain described in terms of rain rate cumulative distribution functions (cdfs), each one with its own rain height, derived from ERA-15 database. When considering stratiform rain, the bright band contribution to attenuation is added. The sensitivity of the model to the few input free parameters that are expected to be latitude dependent, has been investigated by comparing predicted and measured attenuation cdfs in different parts of the globe and at different frequencies.