Spatial and temporal assessment of organic and black carbon at four sites in the interior of South Africa

Limited data currently exist for atmospheric organic carbon (OC) and black carbon (BC) in South Africa (SA). In this paper OC and BC measured in SA were explored in terms of spatial and temporal patterns, mass fractions of the total aerosol mass, as well as possible sources. PM10 and PM2.5 samples were collected at five sites in SA operated within the Deposition of Biogeochemical Important Trace Species-IGAC DEBITS in Africa (DEBITS-IDAF) network. OC were higher than BC concentrations at all sites in both size fractions, while most OC and BC occurred in the PM2.5 fraction. OC/BC ratios reflected the location of the different sites, as well as possible sources impacting these sites. The OC and BC mass fraction percentages of the total aerosol mass varied up to 24% and 12%, respectively. A relatively well defined seasonal pattern was observed, with higher OC and BC measured from May to October, which coincides with the dry season in the interior of SA. An inverse seasonal pattern was observed for the fractional mass contributions of OC and BC to the total aerosol mass, which indicates substantially higher aerosol load during this time of the year. The relationship between OC and BC concentrations with the distance that air mass back trajectories passed by biomass burning fires and large point sources proved that biomass burning fires contribute significantly to regional OC and BC during the burning season, while large point sources did not contribute that significantly to regional OC and BC. The results from a highly industrialised and populated site also indicated that household combustion for space heating contributed at least to local OC and BC concentrations

Acid wet deposition in the Tropics : two case studies using DEBITS measurements.Acid rain.

12-17 juin 200

Sulfur Gas Emissions from African Savanna-Burning

International audienc

Methane, carbon monoxide and light non-methane hydrocarbon emissions from African savanna burnings during the FOS/DECAFE experiment

Atmospheric samples from savanna burnings were collected in the Ivory Coast during two campaigns in January 1989 and January 1991. About 30 nonmethane hydrocarbons from C2 to C6, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and methane were measured from the background and also at various distances from the burning. Concentrations in the fire plume reached ppmv levels for C2-C4 hydrocarbons, and 5300, 500 and 93 ppmv for CO2, CO and CH4 respectively. The excess in the mixing ratios of these gases above their background level is used to derive emission factors relative to CO and CO2. For the samples collected immediately in the fire plume, a differentiation between high and low combustion efficiency conditions is made by considering the CO/CO2 ratio. Ethene (C2H4), acetylene (C2H2), ethane (C2H6) and propene (C3H6) are the major NMHC produced in the flaming stage, whereas a different pattern with an increasing contribution of alkanes is observed in samples typical of post flaming processes. A strong correlation between methane and carbon monoxide suggests that these compounds are produced during the same stage of the combustion. In samples collected at a distance from the fire and integrated over a period of 30 minutes, the composition is very similar to that of flaming. NMHC/CO2 is of the order of 0.7%, CH4/CO2 of the order of 0.4% and CO/CO2 of the order of 6.3%. From this study, a global production by African savanna fires is derived: 65 Tg of CO-C, 4.2 Tg of CH4-C and 6.7 Tg of NMHC-C. Whereas acetylene can be used as a conservative tracer of the fire plumes, only ethene, propene and butenes can be considered in terms of their direct photochemical impact

Spatio-temporal variability of NDVI–precipitation over southernmost South America: possible linkages between climate signals and epidemics

Climate–environment variability affects the rates of incidence of vector-borne and zoonotic diseases and is possibly associated with epidemics outbreaks. Over southernmost South America the joint spatio-temporal evolution of climate–environment is analyzed for the 1982–2004 period. Detailed mapping of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and rainfall variability are then compared to zones with preliminary epidemiological reports. A significant quasi-biennial signal (2.2- to 2.4-year periods, or QB) for joint NDVI–rainfall variability is revealed. From rotated EOFs, dominant NDVI patterns are partitioned according to their lead frequencies: (1) the ‘QB group' (2.1-to 3-year periods) includes six modes over southern Brazil, Uruguay, northern-central Argentina (two modes), the southern Paraguay–northern Argentina border, and the Santa Cruz Province; (2) the QB1 (2.4- to 3-year periods) + quasi-quadrennial (QQ) mode over the Misiones Province; and (3) the QB2 (2.1- to 2.5-year periods) + QQ + inter-annual (IA) (3- to 7-year periods) two modes over south-eastern Argentina. Modes within the ‘QB group' are positively correlated with global climate signals and SST. The Uruguayan mode is correlated with global ENSO (8-month lag) whilst the southern Entre-Rios/northern Buenos Aires provinces are correlated with central equatorial Pacific SSTs (3-month lag). The Santa Cruz (Patagonia) Province is most correlated with the Pacific South America (PSA) index and SST patterns (3-month lag) along the Antarctica circumpolar current. The spatial distribution of lead NDVI modes includes the Formosa, Misiones, Chaco and Buenos Aires provinces among others, known for being prone to vector-borne epidemics such as dengue fever, malaria, leishmaniasis (American cutaneous leishmaniasis or ACL), hantivirus, chagas and Argentine hemorrhagic fever (AHF). Some provinces also correspond to regions where lead NDVI PCs' modes are associated with high-frequency climate signals such as the quasi-biennial oscillation in northwest Argentina. The joint preliminary results (climate–environment–public health reports) presented here for the first time are meant: (1) to contribute to a better understanding of climate–environment–epidemics process-based and modeling studies and (2) to facilitate, in the long run, the implementation of local and regional health early warning systems (HEWS) over southernmost South America. The latter is becoming crucial with ever-increasing migration, urban sprawl (re-emergence of dengue fever epidemics since the late 1990s), all embedded in a climate change context

Dry and Wet atmospheric nitrogen deposition in Africa

This work is part of the IDAF* (IGAC/DEBITS/AFrica) programme which started in 1995 with the establishment of 10 measurement sites representative of major African ecosystems. The objectives of the programme are to study dry and wet deposition of important trace species and more generally the biogeochemical cycles of key nutrients. In this way, the IDAF activity is based on high quality measurements of atmospheric chemical data (gaseous, precipitation and aerosols chemical composition) on the basis of a multi-year monitoring. In this paper, our objective is to present the first estimation of the atmospheric nitrogen deposition budget in Africa based on experimental measurements. To estimate atmospheric nitrogen deposition, including both wet and dry processes, we compiled the IDAF nitrogen data (rain, particles and gases) obtained from the network for three consecutive years: 1998, 1999 and 2000. In western and central Africa, we studied a transect going from dry savanna (Niger and Mali) to humid savanna (Ivory Coast and Central Republic of Africa) and forest (Congo and Cameroon). In South Africa, two IDAF very different sites were chosen to be representative on one hand of a rural (semi-arid savanna) and on the other hand of an industrialized site. Presenting the different components of the nitrogen atmospheric deposition on these sites, i.e, dry deposition in gaseous (NO2, NH3, HNO3) and particulate forms (pNH4+, pNO3-) associated with wet deposition (NH4+, NO3-), this study allows us to give the relative contribution of dry and wet deposition processes to the total nitrogen deposition. The nitrogen atmospheric deposition presented for all the IDAF sites of the african continent range from 8 to 19 kgN.ha-1.yr-1. Sites from dry savanna in South Africa and West Africa have similar values (around 8-9 kgN.ha-1.yr-1 ) which are found in the lower part of the range. Wet zones from savanna and forests give values in the upper range (15 to 19 kgN.ha-1.yr-1). The Amersfoort site, representative of an anthropogenically modified savanna gives values also in the upper range (15 kgN.ha-1.yr-1). Moreover, this study indicates that dry deposition in all the ecosystems dominates and represents about 60-70 percent of the total nitrogen atmospheric deposition (except Amersfoort). These new datasets have led to estimate for the first time the nitrogen budget over the African continent. It is worth noting that the estimated range is similar to modelled ones (Galloway and Cowling, 2002; Rodhe et al, 2002). *IGAC/DEBITS/Africa: International Global Atmospheric Chemistry/ DEposition of Biogeochemically Important Trace Species/Afric