Uncertainties of simulated aerosol optical properties induced by assumptions on aerosol physical and chemical properties: An AQMEII-2 perspective

Curci, Gabriele; Hogrefe, Christian; Bianconi, Roberto; İm, Ulaş; Balzarini, Alessandra; Baró, Rocío; Brunner, Dominik; Forkel, R.; Giordano, Lea; Hirtl, Marcus; Honzak, Luka; Jiménez‐Guerrero, Pedro; Knote, Christoph; Langer, Matthias; Makar, Paul A.; Pirovano, Guido; Pérez, J. L.; José, Roberto San; Syrakov, Dimiter; Tuccella, Paolo; Werhahn, Johannes; Wolke, Ralf; Žabkar, Rahela; Zhang, J.; Galmarini, Stefano

doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2014.09.009

Cited by 101 publications

(114 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…The omitted effects and incomplete representation of mixing state can play an important role in the apportionment of extinction. (Gan et al, 2014b;Curci et al, 2015). Another WRF-CMAQ evaluation study by Hogrefe et al (2015) found that the underestimation of AOD occurs throughout all seasons despite the fact that the analysis of 24 h average surface PM 2.5 predictions (see Table 1 in Hogrefe et al, 2015) indicate overestimations of PM 2.5 during winter but largely unbiased PM 2.5 prediction during summer.…”

Section: Trends In Aerosol Optical Depth (Aod) and Sw Radiationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation "brightening" in the United States

et al. 2015

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Abstract. Long-term simulations with the coupled WRF-CMAQ (Weather Research and Forecasting-Community Multi-scale Air Quality) model have been conducted to systematically investigate the changes in anthropogenic emissions of SO 2 and NO x over the past 16 years (1995)(1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010) across the United States (US), their impacts on anthropogenic aerosol loading over North America, and subsequent impacts on regional radiation budgets. In particular, this study attempts to determine the consequences of the changes in tropospheric aerosol burden arising from substantial reductions in emissions of SO 2 and NO x associated with control measures under the Clean Air Act (CAA) especially on trends in solar radiation. Extensive analyses conducted by Gan et al. (2014a) utilizing observations (e.g., SURFRAD, CASTNET, IMPROVE, and ARM) over the past 16 years (1995-2010) indicate a shortwave (SW) radiation (both allsky and clear-sky) "brightening" in the US. The relationship of the radiation brightening trend with decreases in the aerosol burden is less apparent in the western US. One of the main reasons for this is that the emission controls under the CAA were aimed primarily at reducing pollutants in areas violating national air quality standards, most of which were located in the eastern US, while the relatively less populated areas in the western US were less polluted at the beginning of this study period. Comparisons of model results with observations of aerosol optical depth (AOD), aerosol concentration, and radiation demonstrate that the coupled WRF-CMAQ model is capable of replicating the trends well even though it tends to underestimate the AOD. In particular, the sulfate concentration predictions were well matched with the observations. The discrepancies found in the clear-sky diffuse SW radiation are likely due to several factors such as the potential increase of ice particles associated with increasing air traffic, the definition of "clear-sky" in the radiation retrieval methodology, and aerosol semi-direct and/or indirect effects which cannot be readily isolated from the observed data.

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Section: Trends In Aerosol Optical Depth (Aod) and Sw Radiationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation "brightening" in the United States

et al. 2015

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“…and to the meteorological fields can be for instance higher than the uncertainty linked to PM anthropogenic and biogenic emissions . The uncertainty in PM concentrations leads to uncertainties in the simulated aerosol optical properties and AOD (Péré et al, 2010;Curci et al, 2014), in addition to uncertainties in the calculation of optical properties (refractive indices, assumptions on aerosol mixing, density).…”

Section: G Rea Et Al: Contributions To 2012 Summertime Aerosols In mentioning

confidence: 99%

Source contributions to 2012 summertime aerosols in the Euro-Mediterranean region

et al. 2015

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Abstract. In the Mediterranean area, aerosols may originate from anthropogenic or natural emissions (biogenic, mineral dust, fire and sea salt) before undergoing complex chemistry. In case of a huge pollution event, it is important to know whether European pollution limits are exceeded and, if so, whether the pollution is due to anthropogenic or natural sources. In this study, the relative contribution of emissions to surface PM 10 , surface PM 2.5 and total aerosol optical depth (AOD) is quantified. For Europe and the Mediterranean regions and during the summer of 2012, the WRF and CHIMERE models are used to perform a sensitivity analysis on a 50 km resolution domain (from −10 • W to 40 • E and from 30 • N to 55 • N): one simulation with all sources (reference) and all others with one source removed. The reference simulation is compared to data from the AirBase network and two ChArMEx stations, and from the AERONET network and the MODIS satellite instrument, to quantify the ability of the model to reproduce the observations. It is shown that the correlation ranges from 0.19 to 0.57 for surface particulate matter and from 0.35 to 0.75 for AOD. For the summer of 2012, the model shows that the region is mainly influenced by aerosols due to mineral dust and anthropogenic emissions (62 and 19 %, respectively, of total surface PM 10 and 17 and 52 % of total surface PM 2.5 ). The western part of the Mediterranean is strongly influenced by mineral dust emissions (86 % for surface PM 10 and 44 % for PM 2.5 ), while anthropogenic emissions dominate in the northern Mediterranean basin (up to 75 % for PM 2.5 ). Fire emissions are more sporadic but may represent 20 % of surface PM 2.5 , on average, during the period near local sources. Sea salt mainly contributes for coastal sites (up to 29 %) and biogenic emissions mainly in central Europe (up to 20 %).The same analysis was undertaken for the number of daily exceedances of the European Union limit of 50 µg m −3 for PM 10 (over the stations), and for the number of daily exceedances of the WHO recommendation for PM 2.5 (25 µg m −3 ), over the western part of Europe and the central north. This number is generally overestimated by the model, particularly in the northern part of the domain, but exceedances are captured at the right time. Optimized contributions are computed with the observations, by subtracting the background bias at each station and the specific peak biases from the considered sources. These optimized contributions show that if natural sources such as mineral dust and fire events are particularly difficult to estimate, they were responsible exclusively for 35.9 and 0.7 %, respectively, of the exceedances for PM 10 during the summer of 2012. The PM 25 recommendation of 25 µg m −3 is exceeded in 21.1 % of the cases because of anthropogenic sources exclusively and in 0.02 % because of fires. The other exceedances are induced by a mixed contribution between mainly mineral dust (49.5-67 % for PM 10 exceedance contributions, 4.4-13.8 % for PM 2.5 ), anthropogenic so...

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“…The aerosol is typically modeled in terms of mass concentrations for a limited number of aerosol types divided over a few size bins (sectional aerosol model) or a few modes (modal aerosol models). Thus, realistic optical properties for each size bin of each aerosol type are required for modeling the radiative effects (e.g., Curci et al, 2015).…”

Section: Optical Properties For Sectional Aerosol Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

MOPSMAP v1.0: a versatile tool for the modeling of aerosol optical properties

Gasteiger

Wiegner²

2018

Geosci. Model Dev.

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Abstract. The spatiotemporal distribution and characterization of aerosol particles are usually determined by remotesensing and optical in situ measurements. These measurements are indirect with respect to microphysical properties, and thus inversion techniques are required to determine the aerosol microphysics. Scattering theory provides the link between microphysical and optical properties; it is not only needed for such inversions but also for radiative budget calculations and climate modeling. However, optical modeling can be very time-consuming, in particular if nonspherical particles or complex ensembles are involved.In this paper we present the MOPSMAP package (Modeled optical properties of ensembles of aerosol particles), which is computationally fast for optical modeling even in the case of complex aerosols. The package consists of a data set of pre-calculated optical properties of single aerosol particles, a Fortran program to calculate the properties of userdefined aerosol ensembles, and a user-friendly web interface for online calculations. Spheres, spheroids, and a small set of irregular particle shapes are considered over a wide range of sizes and refractive indices. MOPSMAP provides the fundamental optical properties assuming random particle orientation, including the scattering matrix for the selected wavelengths. Moreover, the output includes tables of frequently used properties such as the single-scattering albedo, the asymmetry parameter, or the lidar ratio. To demonstrate the wide range of possible MOPSMAP applications, a selection of examples is presented, e.g., dealing with hygroscopic growth, mixtures of absorbing and non-absorbing particles, the relevance of the size equivalence in the case of nonspherical particles, and the variability in volcanic ash microphysics.The web interface is designed to be intuitive for expert and nonexpert users. To support users a large set of default settings is available, e.g., several wavelength-dependent refractive indices, climatologically representative size distributions, and a parameterization of hygroscopic growth. Calculations are possible for single wavelengths or user-defined sets (e.g., of specific remote-sensing application). For expert users more options for the microphysics are available. Plots for immediate visualization of the results are shown. The complete output can be downloaded for further applications. All input parameters and results are stored in the user's personal folder so that calculations can easily be reproduced. The web interface is provided at https://mopsmap.net (last access: 9 July 2018) and the Fortran program including the data set is freely available for offline calculations, e.g., when large numbers of different runs for sensitivity studies are to be made.

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Uncertainties of simulated aerosol optical properties induced by assumptions on aerosol physical and chemical properties: An AQMEII-2 perspective

Cited by 101 publications

References 23 publications

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation "brightening" in the United States

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation "brightening" in the United States

Source contributions to 2012 summertime aerosols in the Euro-Mediterranean region

MOPSMAP v1.0: a versatile tool for the modeling of aerosol optical properties

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Uncertainties of simulated aerosol optical properties induced by assumptions on aerosol physical and chemical properties: An AQMEII-2 perspective

Cited by 101 publications

References 23 publications

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation &quot;brightening&quot; in the United States

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation &quot;brightening&quot; in the United States

Source contributions to 2012 summertime aerosols in the Euro-Mediterranean region

MOPSMAP v1.0: a versatile tool for the modeling of aerosol optical properties

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Product

Resources

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Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation "brightening" in the United States

Assessment of long-term WRF–CMAQ simulations for understanding direct aerosol effects on radiation "brightening" in the United States