The Meteorology-Chemistry Interface Processor (MCIP) for the CMAQ modeling system: updates through MCIPv3.4.1

Abstract

Abstract. The Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) modeling system, a state-of-the-science regional air quality modeling system developed by the US Environmental Protection Agency, is being used for a variety of environmental modeling problems including regulatory applications, air quality forecasting, evaluation of emissions control strategies, process-level research, and interactions of global climate change and regional air quality. The MeteorologyChemistry Interface Processor (MCIP) is a vital piece of software within the CMAQ modeling system that serves to, as best as possible, maintain dynamic consistency between the meteorological model and the chemical transport model (CTM). MCIP acts as both a post-processor to the meteorological model and a pre-processor to the emissions and the CTM in the CMAQ modeling system. MCIP's functions are to ingest the meteorological model output fields in their native formats, perform horizontal and vertical coordinate transformations, diagnose additional atmospheric fields, define gridding parameters, and prepare the meteorological fields in a form required by the CMAQ modeling system. This paper provides an updated overview of MCIP, documenting the scientific changes that have been made since it was first released as part of the CMAQ modeling system in 1998.

Regional contributions to particulate matter concentration in the Seoul metropolitan area, South Korea: seasonal variation and sensitivity to meteorology and emissions inventory

“…The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) DEM with 90 m resolution and the Korean Ministry of Environment Land Use/Land Cover data are used for terrain data and surface land type data, respectively. The MeteorologyChemistry Interface Processor (MCIP) (Otte and Pleim, 2010) version 3.6 is used as a preprocessor for CMAQ simulation. CMAQ version 4.7.1, with the AERO5 aerosol module and Statewide Air Pollution Research Center version 99 (SAPRC99; Carter, 2003) used as the chemical mechanism in the chemical transport modeling system.…”

“…Longrange transport in East Asia has been studied to understand the pathways and impacts of dust storms, known as Asian dust or yellow sand (Chun et al, 2001;Chung, 1992;Iwasaka et al, 1983;Kim et al, 2008;Kwon et al, 2002; H. C. Kim et al: Regional contributions to particulate matter concentration 2013), and acidic deposition processes (Larssen et al, 1999;Park et al, 2005). Recently, studies have been conducted on the chemical processes underlying PM formation, including the secondary formation of PM components and the transport patterns related to synoptic meteorology (Chang et al, 2010).…”

Multi-model study of mercury dispersion in the atmosphere: vertical and interhemispheric distribution of mercury species

“…The selected physics options were Thompson (Microphysics Options) (Thompson et al, 2004), Betts-Miller-Janjic (Cumulus Parameterization Options) (Janjic, 1994(Janjic, , 2000, RRTMG (Radiation Physics Options), and BouLac (PBL Physics Options) based on the results of meteorological model performance evaluation . The ARW outputs were processed using MCIPv3.4.1 Otte and Pleim, 2010) to generate model-ready meteorology for chemical transport simulations.…”

The geographic distribution and economic value of climate change-related ozone health impacts in the United States in 2030

“…The historical and future climate WRF outputs were processed by the Meteorology-Chemistry Interface Processor (MCIP) (Otte and Pleim, 2010) and subsequently input into the Community Multi-scale Air Quality model (CMAQ) version 5.0.1 (Byun and Schere, 2006) to assess how the climatedriven meteorological changes would impact near-surface ozone levels (i.e., concentrations within the lowest model layer, about 38 m deep) over the continental United States. The air quality modeling was also conducted at 36-km grid spacing.…”