Atmospheric transport of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) to Bjørnøya (Bear island)

2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (10) ◽  
pp. 1082 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roland Kallenborn ◽  
Guttorm Christensen ◽  
Anita Evenset ◽  
Martin Schlabach ◽  
Andreas Stohl
2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (11) ◽  
pp. 6549-6559 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. M. Hansen ◽  
J. H. Christensen ◽  
C. Geels ◽  
J. D. Silver ◽  
J. Brandt

Abstract. The Danish Eulerian Hemispheric Model (DEHM) was applied to investigate how projected climate changes will affect the atmospheric transport of 13 persistent organic pollutants (POPs) to the Arctic and their environmental fate within the Arctic. Three sets of simulations were performed, one with present day emissions and initial environmental concentrations from a 20-year spin-up simulation, one with present day emissions and with initial environmental concentrations set to zero and one without emissions but with initial environmental concentrations from the 20-year spin-up simulation. Each set of simulations consisted of two 10-year time slices representing the present (1990–2000) and future (2090–2100) climate conditions. DEHM was driven using meteorological input from the global circulation model, ECHAM/MPI-OM, simulating the SRES (Special Report on Emissions Scenarios) A1B climate scenario. Under the applied climate and emission scenarios, the total mass of all compounds was predicted to be up to 55 % lower across the Northern Hemisphere at the end of the 2090s than in the 1990s. The mass of HCHs within the Arctic was predicted to be up to 38 % higher, whereas the change in mass of the PCBs was predicted to range from 38 % lower to 17 % higher depending on the congener and the applied initial environmental concentrations. The results of this study also indicate that contaminants with no or a short emission history will be more rapidly transported to and build up in the arctic environment in a future warmer climate. The process that dominates the environmental behaviour of POPs in the Arctic under a future warmer climate scenario is the shift in mass of POPs from the surface media to the atmosphere induced by the higher mean temperature. This is to some degree counteracted by higher degradation rates also following the higher mean temperature. The more dominant of these two processes depends on the physical-chemical properties of the compounds. Previous model studies have predicted that the effect of a changed climate on the transport of POPs to the Arctic is moderate relative to the effect of proposed changes in emissions, which is confirmed in this study. However, the model studies do not agree on whether climate change acts to reduce or increase environmental concentrations of POPs in the Arctic, and further work is needed to resolve this matter.


2009 ◽  
Vol 9 (17) ◽  
pp. 6597-6610 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Eckhardt ◽  
K. Breivik ◽  
Y. F. Li ◽  
S. Manø ◽  
A. Stohl

Abstract. A key feature of POPs (Persistent Organic Pollutants) is their potential for long-range atmospheric transport. In order to better understand and predict atmospheric source-receptor relationships of POPs, we have modified an existing Lagrangian transport model (FLEXPART) to include some of the key processes that control the atmospheric fate of POPs. We also present four years (2004–2007) of new atmospheric measurement data for polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and hexachlorocyclohexanes (HCHs) obtained at Birkenes, an EMEP (European Monitoring and Evaluation Programme) site in southern Norway. The model overestimates measured PCB-28 and γ-HCH concentrations by factors of 2 and 8, respectively, which is most likely because the emissions used as input to the model are overestimated. FLEXPART captures the temporal variability in the measurements very well and, depending on season, explains 31–67% (14–62%) of the variance of measured PCB-28 (γ-HCH) concentrations. FLEXPART, run in a time-reversed (adjoint) mode, was used to identify the source regions responsible for the POP loading at the Birkenes station. Emissions in Central Europe and Eastern Europe contributed 32% and 24%, respectively, to PCB-28 at Birkenes, while Western Europe was found to be the dominant source (50%) for γ-HCH. Intercontinental transport from North America contributed 13% γ-HCH. While FLEXPART has no treatment of the partitioning of POPs between different surface media, it was found a very useful tool for studying atmospheric source-receptor relationships for POPs and POP-like chemicals that do not sorb strongly to atmospheric particles and whose atmospheric levels are believed to be mainly controlled by primary sources.


2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristóbal Galbán-Malagón ◽  
Naiara Berrojalbiz ◽  
María-José Ojeda ◽  
Jordi Dachs

2014 ◽  
Vol 493 ◽  
pp. 505-520 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Carolina Ruiz-Fernández ◽  
Jorge Feliciano Ontiveros-Cuadras ◽  
José L. Sericano ◽  
Joan-Albert Sanchez-Cabeza ◽  
Laval Liong Wee Kwong ◽  
...  

2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (5) ◽  
pp. 6509-6535 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. M. Hansen ◽  
J. H. Christensen ◽  
C. Geels ◽  
J. D. Silver ◽  
J. Brandt

Abstract. The Danish Eulerian Hemispheric Model (DEHM) was applied to investigate how projected climate changes will affect the atmospheric transport of 13 persistent organic pollutants (POPs) to the Artic and their environmental fate within the Arctic. Two sets of simulations were performed, one with initial environmental concentrations from a 20 year spin-up simulation and one with initial environmental concentrations set to zero. Each set of simulations consisted of two ten-year time slices representing the present (1990–2000) and future (2090–2100) climate conditions. The same POP emissions were applied in all simulations to ensure that the difference in predicted concentrations for each set of simulations only arises from the difference in climate input. DEHM was driven using meteorological input from the global circulation model, ECHAM/MPI-OM, simulating the SRES A1B climate scenario. Under the applied climate and emission scenarios, the total mass of all compounds was predicted to be up to 20% higher across the Northern Hemisphere. The mass of HCHs within the Arctic was predicted to be up to 39% higher, whereas the change in mass of the PCBs was predicted to range from 14% lower to 17% higher depending on the congener and the applied initial environmental concentrations. The results of this study also indicate that contaminants with no or a short emission history will be more rapidly transported to and build up in the arctic environment in a future warmer climate. The process that dominates the environmental behaviour of POPs in the Arctic under a future warmer climate scenario is the shift in mass of POPs from the surface media to the atmosphere induced by the higher mean temperature. This is to some degree counteracted by higher degradation rates also following the higher mean temperature. The more dominant of these two processes depend on the physical-chemical properties of the compounds. Previous model studies have predicted that the effect of a changed climate on the transport of POPs to the Arctic is moderate relatively to the effect of proposed changes in emissions, which is confirmed in this study. However, the model studies do not agree on whether climate change acts to reduce or increase environmental concentrations of POPs in the Arctic, and further work is needed to resolve this matter.


2004 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 1339-1370
Author(s):  
K. M. Hansen ◽  
J. H. Christensen ◽  
J. Brandt ◽  
L. M. Frohn ◽  
C. Geels

Abstract. The Danish Eulerian Hemispheric Model (DEHM) is a 3-D dynamical atmospheric transport model originally developed to describe the atmospheric transport of sulphur into the Arctic. A new version of the model, DEHM-POP, developed to study the atmospheric transport and environmental fate of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) is presented. During environmental cycling, POPs can be deposited and re-emitted several times before reaching a final destination. A description of the exchange processes between the land/ocean surfaces and the atmosphere is included in the model to account for this multi-hop transport. The α-isomer of the pesticide hexachlorocyclohexane (α-HCH) is used as tracer in the model development. The structure of the model and processes included are described in detail. The results from a model simulation showing the atmospheric transport for the years 1991 to 1998 are presented and evaluated against measurements. The annual averaged atmospheric concentration of α-HCH for the 1990s is well described by the model; however, the shorter-term average concentration for most of the stations is not well captured. This indicates that the present simple surface description needs to be refined to get a better description of the air-surface exchange proceses of POPs.


2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (9) ◽  
pp. 658-668
Author(s):  
М. А. Zapevalov ◽  
D. P. Samsonov ◽  
A. I. Kochetkov ◽  
E. M. Pasynkova ◽  
E. G. Bogacheva

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