Emission-Induced Nonlinearities in the Global Aerosol System: Results from the ECHAM5-HAM Aerosol-Climate Model

In a series of simulations with the global ECHAM5-HAM aerosol-climate model, the response to changes in anthropogenic emissions is analyzed. Traditionally, additivity is assumed in the assessment of the aerosol climate impact, as the underlying bulk aerosol models are largely constrained to linearity. The microphysical aerosol module HAM establishes degrees of freedom for nonlinear responses of the aerosol system. In this study’s results, aerosol column mass burdens respond nonlinearly to changes in anthropogenic emissions, manifested in alterations of the aerosol lifetimes. Specific emission changes induce modifications of aerosol cycles with unaltered emissions, indicating a microphysical coupling of the aerosol cycles. Anthropogenic carbonaceous emissions disproportionately contribute to the accumulation mode numbers close to the source regions. In contrast, anthropogenic sulfuric emissions less than proportionally contribute to the accumulation mode numbers close to the source regions and disproportionately contribute in remote regions. The additivity of the aerosol system is analyzed by comparing the changes from a simulation with emission changes for several compounds with the sum of changes of single simulations, in each of which one of the emission changes was introduced. Close to the anthropogenic source regions, deviations from additivity are found at up to 30% and 15% for the accumulation mode number burden and aerosol optical thickness, respectively. These results challenge the traditional approach of assessing the climate impact of aerosols separately for each component and demand for integrated assessments and emission strategies

North Atlantic Oscillation and tropospheric ozone variability in Europe: model analysis and measurements intercomparison

Ozone pollution represents a serious health and environmental problem. While ozone pollution is mostly produced by photochemistry in summer, elevated ozone concentrations can also be influenced by long range transport driven by the atmospheric circulation and stratospheric ozone intrusions. We analyze the role of large scale atmospheric circulation variability in the North Atlantic basin in determining surface ozone concentrations. Here, we show, using ground station measurements and a coupled atmosphere-chemistry model simulation for the period 1980–2005, that the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) does affect surface ozone concentrations – on average, over 10 ppbv on the monthly mean in southwest central and northern Europe – during all seasons except fall. The commonly used NAO index is able to capture the link existing between atmospheric dynamics and surface ozone concentrations in winter and spring but it fails in summer. We find that the first Principal Component, computed from the time variation of the sea level pressure (SLP) field, detects the atmosphere circulation/ozone relationship not only in winter and spring but also during summer, when the atmospheric circulation weakens and regional photochemical processes peak. The first Principal Component of the SLP field could be used as a tool to identify areas more exposed to forthcoming ozone pollution events. Finally, our results suggest that the increasing baseline ozone in western and northern Europe during the 1990s could be related to the prevailing phase of the NAO in that period.JRC.H.7-Climate Risk Managemen

Formation of Secondary Organic Aerosol from Isoprene Oxidation over Europe

The role of isoprene as a precursor to secondary organic aerosol (SOA) over Europe is studied with the two-way nested global chemistry transport model TM5. The inclusion of the formation of SOA from isoprene oxidation in our model almost doubles the atmospheric burden of SOA over Europe compared to SOA formation from terpenes and aromatics. The reference simulation, which considers SOA formation from isoprene, terpenes and aromatics, predicts a yearly European production rate of 1.0 Tg SOA yr-1 and an annual averaged atmospheric burden of about 50 Gg SOA over Europe. A fraction of 35% of the SOA produced in the boundary layer over Europe is transported to higher altitudes or to other world regions. Summertime measurements of particulate organic matter (POM) during the extensive EMEP OC/EC campaign 2002/2003 are better reproduced when SOA formation from isoprene is taken into account, reflecting also the strong seasonality of isoprene and other biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOC) emissions from vegetation. However, during winter, our model strongly underestimates POM, likely caused by missing wood burning in the emission inventories. Uncertainties in the parameterisation of isoprene SOA formation have been investigated. Maximum SOA production is found for irreversible sticking (non-equilibrium partitioning) of condensable vapours on particles, with tropospheric SOA production over Europe increased by a factor of 4 in summer compared to the reference case. Completely neglecting SOA formation from isoprene results in the lowest estimate (0.51 Tg SOA yr-1). The amount and the nature of the absorbing matter are shown to be another key uncertainty when predicting SOA levels. Tropospheric isoprene SOA production over Europe in summer more than doubles when, in addition to preexisting carbonaceous aerosols, condensation of semi volatile vapours on ammonium and sulphate aerosols is considered. Consequently, smog chamber experiments on SOA formation should be performed with different types of seed aerosols and without seed aerosols in order to derive an improved treatment of the absorption of SOA in the models. Consideration of a number of recent insights in isoprene SOA formation mechanisms reduces the tropospheric production of isoprene derived SOA over Europe from 0.4 Tg yr-1 in our reference simulation to 0.1 Tg yr-1JRC.DDG.H.2-Climate chang

Impact on local air quality of the Danish landworks in the fixed link across Øresund.

The combined bridge and tunnel link between Sweden and Denmark (the Øresund Link) and the related land constructions are expected to be in operation around the turn of the century. This new link across the Øresund and the island Amager may result in significant changes in traffic pattern and traffic intensity - and therefore changes in air quality in some areas can not be excluded. An investigation initiated in 1994 on the Danish side of the link comprises monitoring of present air pollution at the Airport Motorway and model evaluations of future pollution levels at the motorway and in six street canyons. For all locations the pollution levels are calculated for the present situation and for scenarios for the years 2000 and 2010 both with and without the fixed link. For the future scenarios an expected development of vehicle technology is taken into account. It appears that the general air quality in the area will not be worsen. Only for benzene there is a continued risk of violation of limit values; this may however be changed by planned emission restrictions.A special situation however, may arise near the apartment buildings "Vinkelhusene". Here it has been decided to cover about 700 m of the motorway, in order to reduce noise and to avoid a barrier effect. This will result in increased pollution levels near the tunnel exits.All calculations are performed with dispersion models developed at the National Environmental Research Institute and are based on traffic scenarios from a traffic model developed by Anders Nyvig Ltd

Aerosol Activation and Cloud Processing in the Global Aerosol-climate Model

A parameterization for cloud processing is presented that calculates activation of aerosol particles to cloud drops, cloud drop size, and pH-dependent aqueous phase sulfur chemistry. The parameterization is implemented in the global aerosol-climate model ECHAM5-HAM. The cloud processing parameterization uses updraft speed, temperature, and aerosol size and chemical parameters simulated by ECHAM5-HAM to estimate the maximum supersaturation at the cloud base, and subsequently the cloud drop number concentration (CDNC) due to activation. In-cloud sulfate production occurs through oxidation of dissolved SO2 by ozone and hydrogen peroxide. The model simulates realistic distributions for annually averaged CDNC although it is underestimated especially in remote marine regions. On average, CDNC is dominated by cloud droplets growing on particles from the accumulation mode, with smaller contributions from the Aitken and coarse modes. The simulations indicate that in-cloud sulfate production is a potentially important source of accumulation mode sized cloud condensation nuclei, due to chemical growth of activated Aitken particles and to enhanced coalescence of processed particles. The strength of this source depends on the distribution of produced sulfate over the activated modes. This distribution is affected by uncertainties in many parameters that play a direct role in particle activation, such as the updraft velocity, the aerosol chemical composition and the organic solubility, and the simulated CDNC is found to be relatively sensitive to these uncertainties.JRC.H.2-Climate chang

Aerosol Distribution over Europe: a Model Evaluation Study with Detailed Aerosol Microphysics

This paper summarizes an evaluation of model simulations with a regional scale atmospheric climate-chemistry/ aerosol model called REMOTE, which has been extended by a microphysical aerosol module. Model results over Europe are presented and compared with available measurements in surface air focusing on the European distribution and variability of primary and secondary aerosols. Additionally, model results obtained with detailed aerosol microphysics are compared to those based on an aerosol bulk mass approach revealing the impact of dry deposition fluxes on atmospheric burden concentration. An improved determination of elevated ozone and sulfate concentrations could be achieved by considering a diurnal cycle in the anthropogenic emission fluxes. Deviation between modelled and measured organic carbon concentrations can be mainly explained by missing formation of secondary organic aerosols and deficiencies in emission data. Changing residential heating practices in Europe, where the use of wood is no longer restricted to rural areas, need to be considered in emission inventories as well as vegetation fire emissions which present a dominant source of organic carbon.JRC.DDG.H.2-Climate chang

Impacts of changing weather patterns due to the global warming on black carbon transport and deposition to the Arctic

By modifying the albedo of the sea ice, black carbon (BC) deposited during the winter in the Arctic might contribute to the observed reduction of the sea ice cover in the recent years. This study attempts to estimate how the modification of large scale weather patterns due to the climate change impacts the transport of BC to the Arctic and its deposition on the sea ice. A new statistical algorithm has been developed to combine reanalysis estimates of three atmospheric patterns that govern the near-surface warming of the Northern Hemisphere in the winter with model estimates of transport and deposition of BC over the arctic sea ice. It was found that two atmospheric patterns have an impact on high latitudes and are closely linked to the sea ice melting tendency, while the third is limited to the lower latitudes. The combined impact of the three independent atmospheric patterns on winter deposition trends of BC between 1980 and 2015 indicates a decreasing tendency over the first-year sea ice cover in the eastern Arctic that melts each summer. On the other hand, the deposition over the multiyear sea ice cover in the central and western Arctic increases. During the last decades the increased BC deposition in the winter could eventually contribute to the enhanced melting of the multiyear sea ice.JRC.C.5-Air and Climat

Il progetto rigenerativo per edifici evolutivi ibridi. Resilienza attiva Convertibilità Valorizzazione

This paper deals with the enhancement of the project for the intervention on existing disused buildings with three sequential objectives: converting tertiary buildings to the hybrid housing function; regenerating buildings, providing them with continuous transformative capacity and making them functionally convertible; providing a housing model of temporary uage duration, according to the principle of House as a Service. Considering the temporal variable, the proposal defines criteria that guide the reconversion of buildings in relation to the dynamic needs of the different categories of users and stakeholders who are involved in the decision-making process and, through the hedonic price method, investigates the influence that the qualities attributed to the performance of the building have on the formation of their value, highlighting the perception of value and the acceptance of green performances

Better constraints on sources of carbonaceous aerosols using a combined 14C – macro tracer analysis in a European rural background site

The source contributions to carbonaceous PM2.5 aerosol were investigated at a European background site at the edge of the Po Valley, in Northern Italy, during the period January - December 2007. Carbonaceous aerosol was described as the sum of eight source components: primary (1) and secondary (2) biomass burning organic carbon, biomass burning elemental carbon (3), primary (4) and secondary (5) fossil fuel burning organic carbon, fossil fuel burning elemental carbon (6), primary (7) and secondary (8) biogenic organic carbon. The concentration of each component was quantified using a set of macro tracers (organic carbon OC, elemental carbon EC, and levoglucosan), micro tracers (arabitol and mannitol), and 14C measurements. This was the first time that 14C measurements were performed on a long time series of data able to represent the entire annual cycle. This set of 6 tracers, together with assumed uncertainty ranges of the ratios of OC-to-EC, and the fraction of modern carbon in the 8 source categories, provides strong constraints to the source contributions to carbonaceous aerosol. The uncertainty of contributions was assessed with a Quasi-Monte Carlo (QMC) method accounting for the variability of OC and EC emission factors, and the uncertainty of reference fractions of modern carbon. During winter biomass burning composed 50% of the total carbon (TC) concentration, while in summer secondary biogenic OC accounted for 45% of TC. The contribution of primary biogenic aerosol particles was negligible during the entire year. Moreover, aerosol associated with fossil fuel burning represented 26% and 43% of TC in winter and summer, respectively. The comparison of source apportionment results in different urban and rural areas showed that the sampling site was mainly affected by local aerosol sources during winter and regional air masses from the nearby Po Valley in summer. This observation was further confirmed by back-trajectory analysis applying the Potential Source Contribution Function method to identify potential source regions. The contribution of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) to the organic mass (OM) was significant during the entire year. SOA accounted for 23% and 83% of OM during winter and summer, respectively. While the summer SOA was dominated by biogenic sources, winter SOA was mainly due to biomass and fossil fuel burning. This indicates that the oxidation of intermediate volatility organic compounds co-emitted with primary organics is a significant source of SOA, as suggested by recent model results and Aerosol Mass Spectrometer measurements in urban regions. Comparison with previous global model simulations, indicates a strong underestimate of wintertime primary aerosol emissions in this region.JRC.H.2-Air and Climat