The effects of simulating volcanic aerosol radiative feedbacks with WRF-Chem during the Eyjafjallajökull eruption, April and May 2010

Abstract. The climate effect of atmospheric aerosols is associated with their influence on the radiative budget of the Earth due to the direct aerosol–radiation interactions (ARIs) and indirect effects, resulting from aerosol–cloud–radiation interactions (ACIs). Online coupled meteorology–chemistry models permit the description of these effects on the basis of simulated atmospheric aerosol concentrations, although there is still some uncertainty associated with the use of these models. Thus, the objective of this work is to assess whether the inclusion of atmospheric aerosol radiative feedbacks of an ensemble of online coupled models improves the simulation results for maximum, mean and minimum temperature at 2 m over Europe. The evaluated models outputs originate from EuMetChem COST Action ES1004 simulations for Europe, differing in the inclusion (or omission) of ARI and ACI in the various models. The cases studies cover two important atmospheric aerosol episodes over Europe in the year 2010: (i) a heat wave event and a forest fire episode (July–August 2010) and (ii) a more humid episode including a Saharan desert dust outbreak in October 2010. The simulation results are evaluated against observational data from the E-OBS gridded database. The results indicate that, although there is only a slight improvement in the bias of the simulation results when including the radiative feedbacks, the spatiotemporal variability and correlation coefficients are improved for the cases under study when atmospheric aerosol radiative effects are included.

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Regional effects of atmospheric aerosols on temperature: an evaluation of an ensemble of on-line coupled models

10.5194/acp-2016-1157 ◽

2017 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Rocío Baró ◽

Laura Palacios-Peña ◽

Alexander Baklanov ◽

Alessandra Balzarini ◽

Dominik Brunner ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Atmospheric Aerosols ◽

Forest Fires ◽

Atmospheric Aerosol ◽

Correlation Coefficients ◽

Coupled Models ◽

Climate Effect ◽

On Line ◽

Simulation Results ◽

Radiative Feedbacks ◽

Aerosol Radiative

Abstract. The climate effect of atmospheric aerosols is associated to their influence on the radiative budget of the Earth due to direct aerosol-radiation interactions (ARI) and indirect effects, resulting from aerosol-cloud interactions (ACI). On-line coupled meteorology-chemistry models permit the description of these effects on the basis of simulated atmospheric aerosol concentrations, although there is still some uncertainty associated to the use of these models. In this sense, the objective of this work is to assess whether the inclusion of atmospheric aerosol radiative feedbacks of an ensemble of on-line coupled models improves the simulation results for maximum, mean and minimum temperature over Europe. The evaluated model outputs originate from EuMetChem COST Action ES1004 simulations for Europe, differing in the inclusion (or omission) of ARI and ACI in the various models. The case studies cover two important atmospheric aerosol episodes over Europe in the year 2010, a heat wave and forest fires episode (July–August 2010) and a more humid episode including a Saharan desert dust outbreak in October 2010. The simulation results are evaluated against observational data from E-OBS gridded database. The results indicate that, although there is only a slight improvement in the bias of the simulation results when including the radiative feedbacks, the spatio-temporal variability and correlation coefficients are improved for the cases under study when atmospheric aerosol radiative effects are included, especially for those areas closest to emissions sources of atmospheric aerosols.

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Impacts of Meteorological Conditions, Aerosol Radiative Feedbacks, and Emission Reduction Scenarios on the Coastal Haze Episodes in Southeastern China in December 2013

Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology ◽

10.1175/jamc-d-16-0229.1 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 56 (5) ◽

pp. 1209-1229 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Jianqiong Zhan ◽

Wenyuan Chang ◽

Wei Li ◽

Yanming Wang ◽

Liqi Chen ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Air Quality ◽

Regional Cooperation ◽

Coastal Region ◽

Northern China ◽

Yangtze River Delta ◽

Meteorological Conditions ◽

Fujian Province ◽

The North ◽

Radiative Feedbacks ◽

Aerosol Radiative

AbstractFujian Province in southeastern coastal China is a relatively clean region with low emissions, as its high altitude isolates it from the rest of the country. However, the region experienced haze episodes on 3–14 December 2013. The authors performed simulations using the Weather Research and Forecasting Model coupled with chemistry (WRF-Chem) to examine the impacts of meteorological conditions, aerosol radiative feedbacks (ARFs; including aerosol direct and nearly first indirect effect), and internal and external emissions reduction scenarios on particulate matter smaller than 2.5 μm (PM2.5) concentrations. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time the WRF-Chem model has been used to study air quality in this region. The model reasonably reproduced the meteorological conditions and PM2.5 concentrations. The analysis demonstrated that the highest-PM2.5 event was associated with a cold surge that promoted the impingement of northern pollutants on the region, and PM2.5 concentrations were sensitive to the emissions from the Yangtze River delta (16.6%) and the North China Plain (12.1%). This suggests that efforts toward coastal air quality improvement require regional cooperation to reduce emissions. Noticeably, ARFs were unlikely to increase PM2.5 concentrations in the coastal region, which was in contrast to the case in northern China. ARFs induced strong clean wind anomalies in the coastal region and also lowered the inland planetary boundary layer, which enhanced the blocking of northern pollutants crossing the high terrain in the north of Fujian Province. This indicates that ARFs tend to weaken the haze intensity in the southeastern coastal region.

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Analysis of the WRF-Chem contributions to AQMEII phase2 with respect to aerosol radiative feedbacks on meteorology and pollutant distributions

Atmospheric Environment ◽

10.1016/j.atmosenv.2014.10.056 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 115 ◽

pp. 630-645 ◽

Cited By ~ 56

Author(s):

Renate Forkel ◽

Alessandra Balzarini ◽

Rocio Baró ◽

Roberto Bianconi ◽

Gabriele Curci ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Radiative Feedbacks ◽

Aerosol Radiative

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Volcanic aerosol radiative properties

Past Global Change Magazine ◽

10.22498/pages.23.2.50 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 23 (2) ◽

pp. 50-51 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Andrew Lacis

Keyword(s):

Radiative Properties ◽

Volcanic Aerosol ◽

Aerosol Radiative

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Large uncertainty in volcanic aerosol radiative forcing derived from ice cores

10.31223/osf.io/mbtg8 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Lauren Marshall ◽

Anja Schmidt ◽

Jill Johnson ◽

Graham Mann ◽

Lindsay Lee ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Radiative Forcing ◽

Ice Cores ◽

Volcanic Aerosol ◽

Large Uncertainty ◽

Aerosol Radiative Forcing ◽

Aerosol Radiative

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Assessment of the radiative effects of aerosols in an on-line coupled model over the Iberian Peninsula

10.5194/acp-2016-473 ◽

2016 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Laura Palacios-Peña ◽

Rocío Baró ◽

Juan L. Guerrero-Rascado ◽

Lucas Alados-Arboledas ◽

Dominik Brunner ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Vertical Distribution ◽

Iberian Peninsula ◽

Chemical Properties ◽

Coupled Model ◽

Computational Effort ◽

Radiative Effects ◽

On Line ◽

Radiative Feedbacks ◽

Earth’S Climate ◽

Aerosol Radiative

Abstract. The effects of atmospheric aerosol particles over the Earth's climate mainly depend on their optical, microphysical and chemical properties, which modify the Earth radiative budget. The aerosol radiative effects can be divided into direct and semi-direct effects, produced by the aerosol-radiation interactions (ARI); and indirect effects, produced by aerosol-cloud interactions (ACI). In this sense the objective of this work is to assess whether the inclusion of aerosol radiative feedbacks in the on-line coupled WRF-Chem model improves the modelling outputs over the Iberian Peninsula (IP). For that purpose, the methodology bases on the evaluation of modelled aerosol optical properties under different simulation scenarios. The evaluated data come from two WRF-Chem simulations for the IP differing in the inclusion/no-inclusion of ARI and ACI (NRF/RF simulations). The case studies cover two episodes with different aerosol types over the IP in 2010, namely a Saharan desert dust outbreak and a forest fire episode. The evaluation uses observational data from AERONET stations and MODIS sensor, including aerosol optical depth (AOD) and Angström exponent (AE). Experimental data of aerosol vertical distribution from the EARLINET Granada station are used for checking the models. The results indicate that for the spatial distribution the best-represented variable is AOD and the largest improvements of including the radiative feedbacks are found for the vertical distribution. In the case of the dust outbreak, a slight improvement(worsening) is produced over the areas with medium(high/low) levels of AOD (−9 %/+12 % of improvement) when including the radiative feedbacks. For the wildfires episode, improvements of AOD representation (up to 11 %) over areas further away from emission sources are estimated, which compensates the computational effort of including aerosol feedbacks in the simulations. No evident improvement is observed for the AE representation, whose variability is largely underpredicted by both simulations.

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Evaluating the representation of aerosol optical properties using an online coupled model over the Iberian Peninsula

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ◽

10.5194/acp-17-277-2017 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 17 (1) ◽

pp. 277-296 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Laura Palacios-Peña ◽

Rocío Baró ◽

Juan Luis Guerrero-Rascado ◽

Lucas Alados-Arboledas ◽

Dominik Brunner ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Optical Properties ◽

Vertical Distribution ◽

Iberian Peninsula ◽

Chemical Properties ◽

Computational Effort ◽

Saharan Dust ◽

Aerosol Optical Properties ◽

Surrounding Water ◽

Radiative Feedbacks ◽

Aerosol Radiative

Abstract. The effects of atmospheric aerosol particles on the Earth's climate mainly depend on their optical, microphysical and chemical properties, which modify the Earth's radiative budget. The aerosol radiative effects can be divided into direct and semi-direct effects, produced by the aerosol–radiation interactions (ARIs), and indirect effects, produced by aerosol–cloud interactions (ACIs). In this sense the objective of this work is to assess whether the inclusion of aerosol radiative feedbacks in the online coupled WRF-Chem model improves the modelling outputs over the Iberian Peninsula (IP) and surrounding water areas. For this purpose, the methodology is based on the evaluation of modelled aerosol optical properties under different simulation scenarios. The evaluated data come from two WRF-Chem simulations for the IP differing in the inclusion/no-inclusion of ARIs and ACIs (RF/NRF simulations). The case studies cover two episodes with different aerosol types over the IP in 2010, namely a Saharan dust outbreak and a forest fire episode. The evaluation uses observational data from AERONET (Aerosol Robotic Network) stations and MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) sensor, including aerosol optical depth (AOD) and Ångström exponent (AE). Experimental data of aerosol vertical distribution from the EARLINET (European Aerosol Research Lidar Network) Granada station are used for checking the models. The results indicate that for the spatial distribution the best-represented variable is AOD and the largest improvements when including the aerosol radiative feedbacks are found for the vertical distribution. In the case of the dust outbreak, a slight improvement (worsening) is produced over the areas with medium (high/low) levels of AOD(−9 % / +12 % of improvement) when including the aerosol radiative feedbacks. For the wildfire episode, improvements of AOD representation (up to 11 %) over areas further away from emission sources are estimated, which compensates for the computational effort of including aerosol feedbacks in the simulations. No clear improvement is observed for the AE representation, the variability of which is largely underpredicted by both simulations.

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