scholarly journals Supplementary material to "Insights into seasonal variation of wet deposition over Southeast Asia via precipitation adjustment from the findings of MICS-Asia III"

Author(s):  
Syuichi Itahashi ◽  
Baozhu Ge ◽  
Keiichi Sato ◽  
Zhe Wang ◽  
Junichi Kurokawa ◽  
...  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (11) ◽  
pp. 8709-8734
Author(s):  
Syuichi Itahashi ◽  
Baozhu Ge ◽  
Keiichi Sato ◽  
Zhe Wang ◽  
Junichi Kurokawa ◽  
...  

Abstract. Asia has attracted research attention because it has the highest anthropogenic emissions in the world, and the Model Inter-Comparison Study for Asia (MICS-Asia) phase III was carried out to foster our understanding of the status of air quality over Asia. This study analyzed wet deposition in southeast Asian countries (Myanmar, Thailand, Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR), Cambodia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia) with the aim of providing insights into the seasonal variation of wet deposition. Southeast Asia was not fully considered in MICS-Asia phase II due to a lack of observational data; however, the analysis period of MICS-Asia III, namely the year 2010, is covered by ground observations of the Acid Deposition Monitoring Network in East Asia (EANET), and the coordinated simulation domain was extended to cover these observation sites. The analyzed species are wet depositions of S (sulfate aerosol, sulfur dioxide (SO2), and sulfuric acid (H2SO4)), N (nitrate aerosol, nitrogen monoxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and nitric acid (HNO3)), and A (ammonium aerosol and ammonia (NH3)). The wet deposition simulated with seven models driven by a unified meteorological model in MICS-Asia III was used with the ensemble approach, which effectively modulates the differences in performance among models. By comparison with EANET observations, although the seven models generally captured the wet depositions of S, N, and A, there were difficulties capturing these in some cases. Considering the model performance for ambient aerosol concentrations over southeast Asia, this failure of models is considered to be related to the difficulty in capturing the precipitation in southeast Asia, especially during the dry and wet seasons. Generally, meteorological fields overestimate the precipitation during the dry season, which leads to the overestimation of wet deposition during this season. To overcome this, a precipitation-adjusted approach that scaled the modeled precipitation to the observed value was applied, and it was demonstrated that the model performance was improved. Satellite measurements were also used to adjust for precipitation data, which adequately accounted for the spatiotemporal precipitation patterns, especially in the dry season. As the statistical scores were mostly improved by this adjustment, the estimation of wet deposition with precipitation adjustment was considered to be superior. To utilize satellite measurements, the spatial distribution of wet deposition was revised. Based on this revision, it was found that Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia were upward corrected, and Myanmar, Thailand, Lao PDR, Cambodia, and the Philippines were downward-corrected; these corrections were up to ±40 %. The improved accuracy of precipitation amount was key to estimating wet deposition in this study. These results suggest that the precipitation-adjusted approach has the potential to obtain accurate estimates of wet deposition through the fusion of models and observations.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Syuichi Itahashi ◽  
Baozhu Ge ◽  
Keiichi Sato ◽  
Zhe Wang ◽  
Junichi Kurokawa ◽  
...  

Abstract. Asia has attracted research attention because it has the highest anthropogenic emissions in the world, and the Model Inter-Comparison Study for Asia (MICS-Asia) Phase III was carried out to foster our understanding on the status of air quality over Asia. This study analyzed wet deposition in Southeast Asian countries (Myanmar, Thailand, Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR), Cambodia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia) with the aim of providing insights into the seasonal variation of wet deposition. Southeast Asia was not fully considered in MICS-Asia Phase II due to a lack of observational data; however, the analysis period of MICS-Asia III, namely, the year 2010, is covered by ground observations of the Acid Deposition Monitoring Network in East Asia (EANET), and the coordinated simulation domain was extended to cover these observation sites. The analyzed species are wet depositions of S (sulfate aerosol, sulfur dioxide (SO2), and sulfuric acid (H2SO4)), N (nitrate aerosol, nitrogen monoxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and nitric acid (HNO3)), and A (ammonium aerosol and ammonia (NH3)). The wet deposition simulated with seven models driven by unified meteorological model in MICS-Asia III was used with the ensemble approach, which effectively modulates the differences in performance among models. By comparison with EANET observations, although the seven models generally captured the wet depositions of S, N, and A, there were difficulties capturing these in some cases. This failure of models is considered to be related to the difficulty in capturing the precipitation in Southeast Asia, especially during the dry and wet seasons. To overcome this, a precipitation-adjusted approach which scaling the modeled precipitation to the observed value was applied, and it was demonstrated that the model performance was improved. Satellite measurements were also used to adjust for precipitation data, which worked well to account for spatio-and-temporal precipitation patterns, especially in the dry season. As the statistical scores were mostly improved by this adjustment, the estimation of wet deposition with precipitation adjustment was considered to be superior. To utilize satellite measurements, the spatial distribution of wet deposition was revised. Based on this revision, it was found that Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia were upward-corrected and Myanmar, Thailand, Lao PDR, Cambodia, and the Philippines were downward-corrected; these corrections were up to ±40 %. The improved accuracy of precipitation amount was key to estimating wet deposition in this study. These results suggest that the precipitation-adjusted approach has the potential to obtain accurate estimates of wet deposition through the fusion of models and observations.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (11) ◽  
pp. 7021-7046
Author(s):  
Yao Ge ◽  
Mathew R. Heal ◽  
David S. Stevenson ◽  
Peter Wind ◽  
Massimo Vieno

Abstract. Atmospheric pollution has many profound effects on human health, ecosystems, and the climate. Of concern are high concentrations and deposition of reactive nitrogen (Nr) species, especially of reduced N (gaseous NH3, particulate NH4+). Atmospheric chemistry and transport models (ACTMs) are crucial to understanding sources and impacts of Nr chemistry and its potential mitigation. Here we undertake the first evaluation of the global version of the EMEP MSC-W ACTM driven by WRF meteorology (1∘×1∘ resolution), with a focus on surface concentrations and wet deposition of N and S species relevant to investigation of atmospheric Nr and secondary inorganic aerosol (SIA). The model–measurement comparison is conducted both spatially and temporally, covering 10 monitoring networks worldwide. Model simulations for 2010 compared use of both HTAP and ECLIPSEE (ECLIPSE annual total with EDGAR monthly profile) emissions inventories; those for 2015 used ECLIPSEE only. Simulations of primary pollutants are somewhat sensitive to the choice of inventory in places where regional differences in primary emissions between the two inventories are apparent (e.g. China) but are much less sensitive for secondary components. For example, the difference in modelled global annual mean surface NH3 concentration using the two 2010 inventories is 18 % (HTAP: 0.26 µg m−3; ECLIPSEE: 0.31 µg m−3) but is only 3.5 % for NH4+ (HTAP: 0.316 µg m−3; ECLIPSEE: 0.305 µg m−3). Comparisons of 2010 and 2015 surface concentrations between the model and measurements demonstrate that the model captures the overall spatial and seasonal variations well for the major inorganic pollutants NH3, NO2, SO2, HNO3, NH4+, NO3-, and SO42- and their wet deposition in East Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe, and North America. The model shows better correlations with annual average measurements for networks in Southeast Asia (mean R for seven species: R7‾=0.73), Europe (R7‾=0.67), and North America (R7‾=0.63) than in East Asia (R5‾=0.35) (data for 2015), which suggests potential issues with the measurements in the latter network. Temporally, both model and measurements agree on higher NH3 concentrations in spring and summer and lower concentrations in winter. The model slightly underestimates annual total precipitation measurements (by 13 %–45 %) but agrees well with the spatial variations in precipitation in all four world regions (0.65–0.94 R range). High correlations between measured and modelled NH4+ precipitation concentrations are also observed in all regions except East Asia. For annual total wet deposition of reduced N, the greatest consistency is in North America (0.75–0.82 R range), followed by Southeast Asia (R=0.68) and Europe (R=0.61). Model–measurement bias varies between species in different networks; for example, bias for NH4+ and NO3- is largest in Europe and North America and smallest in East Asia and Southeast Asia. The greater uniformity in spatial correlations than in biases suggests that the major driver of model–measurement discrepancies (aside from differing spatial representativeness and uncertainties and biases in measurements) are shortcomings in absolute emissions rather than in modelling the atmospheric processes. The comprehensive evaluations presented in this study support the application of this model framework for global analysis of current and potential future budgets and deposition of Nr and SIA.


2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 3219-3250 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. J. Jin ◽  
N. J. Livesey ◽  
J. H. Jiang ◽  
A. Lupu ◽  
J. W. Kaminski ◽  
...  

Abstract. Multi-year Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) carbon monoxide (CO) measurements at 215 hPa are employed to present a climatological view of seasonal variation of upper tropospheric trans-Pacific transport of Asian air pollution. The measurements show that the transport peaks in late boreal spring and early boreal summer. Although the strongest Asian air pollution outflow occurs in boreal summer, the "transport pathway" over the northeast Pacific is narrower in summer than in spring. Results from two tropospheric chemistry models GEOS-Chem and GEM-AQ are compared to MLS observations. Both models reproduce the strong trans-Pacific transport in boreal spring and summer well, but show different morphologies over Southeast Asia in winter and fall. A tagged CO simulation using GEOS-Chem indicates that Asian fossil fuel is the biggest source of upper tropospheric CO over the north Pacific in all seasons, excepting methane (CH4) and non-methane hydrocarbons, although there are large fires in Southeast Asia in boreal spring and fall. A sensitivity test indicates that deep convection has a large effect on upper tropospheric CO abundances, increasing the abundances by more than 40%, over the north Pacific in boreal spring. In boreal summer, however, the increase is not significant over the north Pacific although it is large over continental Asia.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yao Ge ◽  
Mathew R. Heal ◽  
David S. Stevenson ◽  
Peter Wind ◽  
Massimo Vieno

Abstract. Atmospheric pollution has many profound effects on human health, ecosystems, and the climate. Of concern are high concentrations and deposition of reactive nitrogen (Nr) species, especially of reduced N (gaseous NH3, particulate NH4+). Atmospheric chemistry and transport models (ACTMs) are crucial to understanding sources and impacts of Nr chemistry and its potential mitigation. Here we undertake the first evaluation of the global version of the EMEP MSC-W ACTM driven by WRF meteorology (1° × 1° resolution), with a focus on surface concentrations and wet deposition of N and S species relevant to investigation of atmospheric Nr and secondary inorganic aerosol (SIA). The model-measurement comparison is conducted both spatially and temporally, covering 9 monitoring networks worldwide. Model simulations for 2010 compared use of both HTAP and ECLIPSEE (ECLIPSE annual total with EDGAR monthly profile) emissions inventories; those for 2015 used ECLIPSEE only. Simulations of primary pollutants are somewhat sensitive to the choice of inventory in places where regional differences in primary emissions between the two inventories are apparent (e.g. China), but much less so for secondary components. For example, the difference in modelled global annual mean surface NH3 concentration using the two 2010 inventories is 18 % (HTAP: 0.26 μg m−3; ECLIPSEE: 0.31 μg m−3) but only 3.5 % for NH4+ (HTAP: 0.316 μg m−3; ECLIPSEE: 0.305 μg m−3). Comparisons of 2010 and 2015 surface concentrations between model and measurement demonstrate that the model captures well the overall spatial and seasonal variations of the major inorganic pollutants NH3, NO2, SO2, HNO3, NH4+, NO3−, SO42−, and their wet deposition in East Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe and North America. The model shows better correlations with annual average measurements for networks in Southeast Asia (Mean R for 7 species:  = 0.73), Europe ( = 0.67) and North America ( = 0.63) than in East Asia ( = 0.35) (data for 2015), which suggests potential issues with the measurements in the latter network. Temporally, both model and measurement agree on higher NH3 concentrations in spring and summer, and lower concentrations in winter. The model slightly underestimates annual total precipitation measurements (by 13–34 %) but agrees well with the spatial variations in precipitation in all four world regions (0.65–0.78 R range). High correlations between measured and modelled NH4+ precipitation concentrations are also observed in all regions except East Asia. For annual total wet deposition of reduced N, the greatest consistency is in North America (R = 0.75), followed by Southeast Asia (R = 0.68) and Europe (R = 0.61). Model-measurement bias varies between species in different networks; for example, bias for NH4+ and NO3− is most in Europe and North America and least in East and Southeast Asia. The greater uniformity in spatial correlations than in biases suggests that the major driver of model-measurement discrepancies (aside from differing spatial representativeness and uncertainties and biases in measurements) are shortcomings in absolute emissions rather than in modelling the atmospheric processes. The comprehensive evaluations presented in this study support the application of this model framework for global analysis of current and potential future budgets and deposition of Nr and SIA.


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