CORE
🇺🇦
make metadata, not war
Services
Services overview
Explore all CORE services
Access to raw data
API
Dataset
FastSync
Content discovery
Recommender
Discovery
OAI identifiers
OAI Resolver
Managing content
Dashboard
Bespoke contracts
Consultancy services
Support us
Support us
Membership
Sponsorship
Community governance
Advisory Board
Board of supporters
Research network
About
About us
Our mission
Team
Blog
FAQs
Contact us
A 60 yr record of atmospheric carbon monoxide reconstructed from Greenland firn air
Authors
MO Battle
T Blunier
+22 more
J Chappellaz
DM Etheridge
G Forster
S Hammer
J Kaiser
JF Lamarque
P Lang
RL Langenfelds
I Levin
J Mak
P Martinerie
P Novelli
VV Petrenko
G Petron
J Schwander
JP Severinghaus
LP Steele
K Steffen
WT Sturges
Z Wang
JWC White
E Witrant
Publication date
19 August 2013
Publisher
eScholarship, University of California
Abstract
We present the first reconstruction of the Northern Hemisphere (NH) high latitude atmospheric carbon monoxide (CO) mole fraction from Greenland firn air. Firn air samples were collected at three deep ice core sites in Greenland (NGRIP in 2001, Summit in 2006 and NEEM in 2008). CO records from the three sites agree well with each other as well as with recent atmospheric measurements, indicating that CO is well preserved in the firn at these sites. CO atmospheric history was reconstructed back to the year 1950 from the measurements using a combination of two forward models of gas transport in firn and an inverse model. The reconstructed history suggests that Arctic CO in 1950 was 140-150 nmol mol-1, which is higher than today's values. CO mole fractions rose by 10-15 nmol mol-1 from 1950 to the 1970s and peaked in the 1970s or early 1980s, followed by a ≈ 30 nmol mol-1 decline to today's levels. We compare the CO history with the atmospheric histories of methane, light hydrocarbons, molecular hydrogen, CO stable isotopes and hydroxyl radicals (OH), as well as with published CO emission inventories and results of a historical run from a chemistry-transport model. We find that the reconstructed Greenland CO history cannot be reconciled with available emission inventories unless unrealistically large changes in OH are assumed. We argue that the available CO emission inventories strongly underestimate historical NH emissions, and fail to capture the emission decline starting in the late 1970s, which was most likely due to reduced emissions from road transportation in North America and Europe. © Author(s) 2013
Similar works
Full text
Available Versions
Sustaining member
eScholarship - University of California
See this paper in CORE
Go to the repository landing page
Download from data provider
oai:escholarship.org:ark:/1303...
Last time updated on 17/08/2022