Characterisation of particulate matter at a high-altitude site in southwest India: Impact of dust episodes

Buchunde, P.; Safai, P.D.; Mukherjee, Subrata; Leena, P.P.; Siingh, Devendraa; Meena, G. S.; Pandithurai, G.

doi:10.1007/s12040-019-1265-8

Cited by 19 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…A similar impact of mountainvalley circulations on air pollution was observed by Bei et al (2018). Studies at high-altitude sites in southwestern India have also found that diurnal variations of aerosol particle concentrations were related to mountain-valley winds and the variation in planetary boundary layer height (Buchunde et al, 2019).…”

Section: Mechanism Of Day-night Variationsupporting

confidence: 62%

“…There is increasing interest in atmospheric aerosol studies at high-altitude sites. Studies have investigated the aerosol chemical composition in mountainous regions, highlighting the influence of mountain valleys, nighttime mountain breeze, and topography in dispersing polluted air masses to the free troposphere (Zhang et al, 2009;Alastuey et al, 2005;Buchunde et al, 2019;Leena et al, 2017;Glasius et al, 2018;Lugauer et al, 1998;Mukherjee et al, 2020). Furthermore, other studies at the northeastern Himalayas, India (Chatterjee et al, 2010), the Bachelor Observatory Mountain in Oregon, USA (Ambrose et al, 2011), and a mountain site at Lulang on the southeastern Tibetan Plateau, China (Zhao et al, 2013), have reported the importance of the aerosol chemical composition at mountain sites in the identification of potential source regions of anthropogenic pollutants and their mechanism of transport.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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First insights into northern Africa high-altitude background aerosol chemical composition and source influences

et al. 2021

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Abstract. Field measurements were conducted to determine aerosol chemical composition at a newly established remote high-altitude site in North Africa at the Atlas Mohammed V (AMV) atmospheric observatory located in the Middle Atlas Mountains. The main objectives of the present work are to investigate the variations in the aerosol composition and better assess global and regional changes in atmospheric composition in North Africa. A total of 200 particulate matter (PM10) filter samples were collected at the site using a high-volume (HV) collector in a 12 h sampling interval from August to December 2017. The chemical composition of the samples was analyzed for trace metals, water-soluble ions, organic carbon (OC/EC), aliphatic hydrocarbons, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) contents. The results indicate that high-altitude aerosol composition is influenced by both regional and transregional transport of emissions. However, local sources play an important role, especially during low wind speed periods, as observed for November and December. During background conditions characterized by low wind speeds (avg. 3 m s-1) and mass concentrations in the range from 9.8 to 12 μg m-3, the chemical composition is found to be dominated by inorganic elements, mainly suspended dust (61 %) and ionic species (7 %), followed by organic matter (7 %), water content (12 %), and unidentified mass (11 %). Despite the proximity of the site to the Sahara, its influence on the atmospheric composition at this high-altitude site was mainly seasonal and accounted for only 22 % of the sampling duration. Biogenic organics contributed up to 7 % of the organic matter with high contributions from compounds such as heneicosane, hentriacontane, and nonacosane. The AMV site is dominated by four main air mass inflows, which often leads to different aerosol chemical compositions. Mineral dust influence was seasonal and ranged between 21 % and 74 % of the PM mass, with peaks observed during the summer, and was accompanied by high concentrations of SO42- of up to 3.0 μg m-3. During winter, PM10 concentrations are low (<30 μg m-3), the influence of the desert is weaker, and the marine air masses (64 %) are more dominant with a mixture of sea salt and polluted aerosol from the coastal regions (Rabat and Casablanca). During the daytime, mineral dust contribution to PM increased by about 42 % because of road dust resuspension. In contrast, during nighttime, an increase in the concentrations of alkanes, PAHs, alkane-2-ones, and anthropogenic metals such as Pb, Ni, and Cu was found due to variations in the boundary layer height. The results provide the first detailed seasonal and diurnal variation of the aerosol chemical composition, which is valuable for long-term assessment of climate and regional influence of air pollution in North Africa.

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Section: Mechanism Of Day-night Variationsupporting

confidence: 62%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

First insights into northern Africa high-altitude background aerosol chemical composition and source influences

et al. 2021

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“…A similar impact of mountain-valley circulations on air pollution was observed by Bei et al (2018). Studies at high-altitude sites in southwest India, also found that diurnal variations of aerosol particle concentrations were related to mountain 795 valley winds and the variation in a planetary boundary layer height (Buchunde et al, 2019).…”

Section: Mechanism Of Day-night Variationmentioning

confidence: 92%

First insights into Northern Africa high-altitude background aerosol chemical composition and source influences

Deabji

Fomba

Hajjaji

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Abstract. Field measurements were conducted to determine aerosol chemical composition in a newly established remote high-altitude site in North Africa to investigate the variations in aerosol composition useful in assessing global and regional changes in atmospheric composition. Particulate matter (PM10) filter samples (200) were collected at the Atlas Mohammed V atmospheric observatory (AM5) located in the Middle-Atlas Mountains in Morocco using a high-volume (HV) collector in a 12 h sampling interval from August to December 2017. The chemical composition of the samples was analyzed for trace metals, ions, elemental carbon, organic carbon, aliphatic hydrocarbons, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAHs) content. The results indicate that high-altitudes aerosol composition is influenced by both regional as well as trans-regional transport of emissions. However, local sources play an important role, especially during low wind speed periods, as observed for November and December. Despite the proximity of the site to the Sahara Desert, its influence on the atmospheric composition at this high-altitude site was mainly seasonal and accounted for only 14 % of the sampling duration. Background conditions at this remote site are characterized by low wind speeds (Av. 2.5 m/s) and mass concentrations in the range of 9.8 and 20 µg/m3. The chemical composition is found to be dominated by inorganic elements, mainly suspended dust (47 %) and ionic species (16 %), followed by organic matter (15 %), water content (12 %), and indeterminate mass (9 %). Biogenic organics contributed up to 7 % of the organic matter with high contributions from compounds such as Nonacosane, Heptacosane, and 2-Pentadecanone. The AM5 site is dominated by four main air mass inflow, which often leads to different aerosol chemical compositions. Mineral dust influenced was seasonal and ranged between 20 and 70 % of the PM mass with peaks observed during the summer and was accompanied by high concentrations of SO42− of up to 1.3 µg/m3. During winter, PM10 concentrations are low (

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“…Based on the data collected at HACPL by the various in-situ instruments, some studies in the past performed to understand cloud-aerosol interaction over the Western Ghats (Anil Kumar et al, 2016;Buchunde et al, 2019;Das et al, 2017Das et al, , 2020Jayachandran et al, 2018;Konwar et al, 2010Konwar et al, , 2014Krishna et al, 2021;Kumar et al, 2022;Kumar & Silva, 2019;Leena et al, 2016Leena et al, , 2018Leena et al, , 2021Mukherjee et al, 2018;Singla et al, 2017;Sumesh et al, 2019Sumesh et al, , 2021Utsav et al, 2017;Varghese et al, 2021;. To study the diurnal variation of DSD, we use an impact-based disdrometer, i.e., Joss-Waldvogel Disdrometer (JWD) (Joss & Waldvogel, 1969) measurements during the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM: June, July, August and September month) period between 2015 and 2019 at the HACPL, Mahabaleshwar, which is situated in the windward side of the Western Ghats in India.…”

Section: Joss-waldvogel Disdrometermentioning

confidence: 99%

Diurnal variation of rain drop size distribution over the Western Ghats in India

Kumar,

Srivas,

Chakravarty

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Joss-Waldvogel Disdrometer (JWD) measurements at the High-Altitude Cloud Physics Laboratory (HACPL: 17.56°N, 73.4°E, above 1373 m MSL), Mahabaleshwar were investigated for determining the diurnality of the drop size distribution (DSD) associated with the precipitation characteristics over the Western Ghats. Here, we examined the JWD data from 2015 to 2019 collected during the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) season. The number concentration of rain droplets of various diameters is considerably varying with the rain rate (R) and type of precipitating cloud. With increasing the value of R, rain droplets having larger diameter concentration significantly increase, and distribution tail moves to the biggest droplets. The average of reflectivity (Z), R, liquid water content (LWC), mass-weighted mean diameter (Dm), and normalized intercept parameter (log10Nw) have higher values from the heavy rainfall (Rhigh ≥10 mm/hr) in comparison to the low rainfall (Rlow < 10 mm/hr) for seasonal rainfall. The gamma distribution of DSD shows significant difference during the low and heavy precipitation on different time period (e.g. 00-06, 06-12, 12-18, 18-24 LST). The number of rain events contributing to the total accumulated rain varies with time. The maximum number of rain events occurred during 12-18 LST, with 23.6 % rain events of low rainfall and 4.9% of heavy rainfall. The bimodality is observed in the diurnal variation of Dm, R, and Z, with the largest peak recorded in the late afternoon (13-16 LST) and the second crest in the early morning hours (05 LST). At the same time, the log10Nw value drops down, indicating the lowest concentration of rain droplets. Several factors, like the land-sea breeze, complex mountainous terrain, and amount of surface reaching solar radiation may control the formation of precipitating clouds at the microphysical scale on the windward side of the Western Ghats, and may also responsible for the observed diurnality in DSD.

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Characterisation of particulate matter at a high-altitude site in southwest India: Impact of dust episodes

Cited by 19 publications

References 61 publications

First insights into northern Africa high-altitude background aerosol chemical composition and source influences

First insights into northern Africa high-altitude background aerosol chemical composition and source influences

First insights into Northern Africa high-altitude background aerosol chemical composition and source influences

Diurnal variation of rain drop size distribution over the Western Ghats in India

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