The project ChArMEx - Chemistry Aerosol Mediterranean Experiment.

Abstract

ChArMEx is a new regional project on tropospheric chemistry and aerosols in the Mediterranean proposed by the French community, calling for international cooperation. ChArMEx proposes an integrated modelling and observational approach to study budgets of species, chemical and dynamical processes, intense events, trends, and impacts. The objectives include an assessment of the recent past, present and future states of the atmospheric chemistry and of related impacts on air quality, regional climate and marine biogeochemistry.The experimental strategy includes long-term monitoring, 2 years of enhanced surface observations, and summer intensive campaigns with research aircrafts and drifting balloons to study the aging of continental air masses over the basin when pollutants and desert dusts are at their maximum and likely impact the regional climate. Focus is presently put on the western basin. Synergies are built with other Mediterranean projects on the hydrological cycle (HyMEx) and marine ecosystems (MERMEX)