Organic aerosol in air of Siberia and the Arctic. Part 3. Forest fire porducts

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Forest Fire ◽  
Organic Aerosol ◽  
The Arctic

scholarly journals Climate change and forest management affect forest fire risk in Fennoscandia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Forest Management ◽  
Black Carbon ◽  
Forest Fire ◽  
Forest Fires ◽  
Fire Risk ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Large Fires ◽  
Forest Fire Risk ◽  
Fire Ignition

Forest and wildland fires are a natural part of ecosystems worldwide, but large fires in particular can cause societal, economic and ecological disruption. Fires are an important source of greenhouse gases and black carbon that can further amplify and accelerate climate change. In recent years, large forest fires in Sweden demonstrate that the issue should also be considered in other parts of Fennoscandia. This final report of the project “Forest fires in Fennoscandia under changing climate and forest cover (IBA ForestFires)” funded by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, synthesises current knowledge of the occurrence, monitoring, modelling and suppression of forest fires in Fennoscandia. The report also focuses on elaborating the role of forest fires as a source of black carbon (BC) emissions over the Arctic and discussing the importance of international collaboration in tackling forest fires. The report explains the factors regulating fire ignition, spread and intensity in Fennoscandian conditions. It highlights that the climate in Fennoscandia is characterised by large inter-annual variability, which is reflected in forest fire risk. Here, the majority of forest fires are caused by human activities such as careless handling of fire and ignitions related to forest harvesting. In addition to weather and climate, fuel characteristics in forests influence fire ignition, intensity and spread. In the report, long-term fire statistics are presented for Finland, Sweden and the Republic of Karelia. The statistics indicate that the amount of annually burnt forest has decreased in Fennoscandia. However, with the exception of recent large fires in Sweden, during the past 25 years the annually burnt area and number of fires have been fairly stable, which is mainly due to effective fire mitigation. Land surface models were used to investigate how climate change and forest management can influence forest fires in the future. The simulations were conducted using different regional climate models and greenhouse gas emission scenarios. Simulations, extending to 2100, indicate that forest fire risk is likely to increase over the coming decades. The report also highlights that globally, forest fires are a significant source of BC in the Arctic, having adverse health effects and further amplifying climate warming. However, simulations made using an atmospheric dispersion model indicate that the impact of forest fires in Fennoscandia on the environment and air quality is relatively minor and highly seasonal. Efficient forest fire mitigation requires the development of forest fire detection tools including satellites and drones, high spatial resolution modelling of fire risk and fire spreading that account for detailed terrain and weather information. Moreover, increasing the general preparedness and operational efficiency of firefighting is highly important. Forest fires are a large challenge requiring multidisciplinary research and close cooperation between the various administrative operators, e.g. rescue services, weather services, forest organisations and forest owners is required at both the national and international level.

scholarly journals Arctic marine secondary organic aerosol contributes significantly to summertime particle size distributions in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 2787-2812 ◽  
Author(s):  
Betty Croft ◽  
Randall V. Martin ◽  
W. Richard Leaitch ◽  
Julia Burkart ◽  
Rachel Y.-W. Chang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Particle Size ◽  
Size Distribution ◽  
Secondary Organic Aerosol ◽  
Canadian Arctic ◽  
Particle Growth ◽  
Organic Aerosol ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Canadian Arctic Archipelago ◽  
Size Distributions ◽  
Fractional Error

Abstract. Summertime Arctic aerosol size distributions are strongly controlled by natural regional emissions. Within this context, we use a chemical transport model with size-resolved aerosol microphysics (GEOS-Chem-TOMAS) to interpret measurements of aerosol size distributions from the Canadian Arctic Archipelago during the summer of 2016, as part of the “NETwork on Climate and Aerosols: Addressing key uncertainties in Remote Canadian Environments” (NETCARE) project. Our simulations suggest that condensation of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) from precursor vapors emitted in the Arctic and near Arctic marine (ice-free seawater) regions plays a key role in particle growth events that shape the aerosol size distributions observed at Alert (82.5∘ N, 62.3∘ W), Eureka (80.1∘ N, 86.4∘ W), and along a NETCARE ship track within the Archipelago. We refer to this SOA as Arctic marine SOA (AMSOA) to reflect the Arctic marine-based and likely biogenic sources for the precursors of the condensing organic vapors. AMSOA from a simulated flux (500 µgm-2day-1, north of 50∘ N) of precursor vapors (with an assumed yield of unity) reduces the summertime particle size distribution model–observation mean fractional error 2- to 4-fold, relative to a simulation without this AMSOA. Particle growth due to the condensable organic vapor flux contributes strongly (30 %–50 %) to the simulated summertime-mean number of particles with diameters larger than 20 nm in the study region. This growth couples with ternary particle nucleation (sulfuric acid, ammonia, and water vapor) and biogenic sulfate condensation to account for more than 90 % of this simulated particle number, which represents a strong biogenic influence. The simulated fit to summertime size-distribution observations is further improved at Eureka and for the ship track by scaling up the nucleation rate by a factor of 100 to account for other particle precursors such as gas-phase iodine and/or amines and/or fragmenting primary particles that could be missing from our simulations. Additionally, the fits to the observed size distributions and total aerosol number concentrations for particles larger than 4 nm improve with the assumption that the AMSOA contains semi-volatile species: the model–observation mean fractional error is reduced 2- to 3-fold for the Alert and ship track size distributions. AMSOA accounts for about half of the simulated particle surface area and volume distributions in the summertime Canadian Arctic Archipelago, with climate-relevant simulated summertime pan-Arctic-mean top-of-the-atmosphere aerosol direct (−0.04 W m−2) and cloud-albedo indirect (−0.4 W m−2) radiative effects, which due to uncertainties are viewed as an order of magnitude estimate. Future work should focus on further understanding summertime Arctic sources of AMSOA.

Satellite-Based Analysis of Fire Events and Transport of Emissions in the Arctic

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anu-Maija Sundström ◽  
Tomi Karppinen ◽  
Antti Arola ◽  
Larisa Sogacheva ◽  
Hannakaisa Lindqvist ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Greenhouse Gases ◽  
Forest Fire ◽  
Forest Fires ◽  
Arctic Region ◽  
Satellite Observations ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Radiative Balance ◽  
Fire Emissions ◽  
Smoke Plumes ◽  
Absorbing Aerosols

<p>Climate change is proceeding fastest in the Arctic region. During past years Arctic summers have been warmer and drier elevating the risk for extensive forest fire episodes. In fact, satellite observations show, that during past two summers (2018, 2019) an increase is seen in the number of fires occurring above the Arctic Circle, especially in Siberia. While human-induced emissions of long-lived greenhouse gases are the main driving factor of global warming, short-lived climate forcers or pollutants emitted from the forest fires are also playing an important role especially in the Arctic. Absorbing aerosols can cause direct arctic warming locally. They can also alter radiative balance when depositing onto snow/ice and decreasing the surface albedo, resulting in subsequent warming. Aerosol-cloud interaction feedbacks can also enhance warming. Forest fire emissions also affect local air quality and photochemical processes in the atmosphere. For example, CO contributes to the formation of tropospheric ozone and affects the abundance of greenhouse gases such as methane and CO<sub>2</sub>.</p><p>This study focuses on analyzing fire episodes in the Arctic for the past 10 years, as well as investigating the transport of forest fire CO and smoke aerosols to the Arctic. Smoke plumes and their transport are analyzed using Absorbing Aerosol Index (AAI) from several satellite instruments: GOME-2 onboard Metop A and B, OMI onboard Aura, and TROPOMI onboard Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite. Observations of CO are obtained from IASI (Metop A and B) as well as from TROPOMI, while the fire observations are obtained from MODIS instruments onboard Aqua and Terra, as well as from VIIRS onboard Suomi NPP.  In addition, observations e.g. from a space-borne lidar, CALIPSO, is used to obtain vertical distribution of smoke and to estimate plume heights.</p>

Characterization of organic aerosol across the Arctic land surface

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Imad El Haddad ◽  
Vaios Moschos ◽  
Julia Schmale ◽  
Urs Baltensperger ◽  
André S.H. Prévôt
Keyword(s):  
Mass Spectrometry ◽  
High Resolution ◽  
Organic Compounds ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Organic Aerosol ◽  
Anthropogenic Sources ◽  
Charge Ratio ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Aerosol Mass ◽  
Long Time

<p>Organic compounds are of high importance in the Arctic because they contribute between one and two thirds to the submicron aerosol mass and may be co-emitted or interact with other aerosol species, such as black carbon, sulfate and metals; they also act as a vehicle of transport for persistent organic pollutants to the Arctic. Organic-containing aerosols (OA) can both absorb and scatter light, thereby changing the radiative balance, and may act as cloud condensation nuclei. OA might become increasingly important in a warming Arctic due to anthropogenic activities and natural emissions, e.g., as a result of expanded vegetation, intensified wildfires, decreasing sea ice extent and thickness leading to higher release of marine volatile organic compounds, and thawing tundra soils (permafrost) along shores and rivers. The continuous monitoring of organic carbon along with a detailed chemical analysis to determine its natural and anthropogenic sources, seasonal variability and inter-annual evolution in the Arctic is of prime importance for improved climate simulations and a realistic assessment of the effectiveness of potential mitigation or adaptation actions.</p><p>The OA chemical composition and corresponding sources remain largely unknown, partly due to the challenging measurement conditions. For example, tremendous effort is required for the deployment of online aerosol mass spectrometry at various environments for long time periods. To overcome this challenge, an offline Aerodyne aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) technique has been introduced based on re-aerosolized liquid filter extracts. The method is capable of covering broad spatial and seasonal observations as well as determining the sources of OA (e.g. primary versus secondary, biogenic versus anthropogenic). Within the project iCUPE (Integrative and Comprehensive Understanding on Polar Environments), we extend the coverage of this technique to the most climate change sensitive region worldwide, using year-long/multi-year (from 2014 to 2019) quartz fiber filter samples collected at 8 surface stations from 68° N to 83°N, covering six Arctic Council nations including the least investigated Siberian Arctic.</p><p>Here, we present a project overview and first results from filter water extracts nebulized in Argon and measured with a high-resolution Long-Time-of-Flight AMS (average resolution ~7k). Preliminary data suggest significant variability among different sites and seasons with regard to the relative fraction of fragments-markers of certain sources, indicating largely regionally-specific sources of OA across the Arctic land surface. For example, during the same time period we observed more (roughly 90%) and more strongly oxygenated fragments (especially mass to charge ratio m/z 44) at extremely remote sites. Our average f<sub>CO2</sub> (m/z=44) of 0.26 ± 0.08 and CO<sup>+</sup>:CO<sub>2</sub><sup>+</sup> of 0.40 ± 0.14 both indicate more oxidized OA than in continental aerosols. The Van Krevelen diagram shows that the addition of carboxylic acid groups (or alcohol+carbonyl on different C atoms) with significant fragmentation may dominate the OA oxidation at high O:C. We further discuss the integration of this analysis with advanced statistical tools for factor identification on the OA fraction. Additionally, the samples will be characterized with ultra-high-resolution mass spectrometry coupled with liquid chromatography, for a two-dimensional molecular identification of primary aerosol tracers and secondary organic aerosol precursors.</p>

scholarly journals Arctic marine secondary organic aerosol contributes significantly to summertime particle size distributions in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Betty Croft ◽  
Randall V. Martin ◽  
W. Richard Leaitch ◽  
Julia Burkart ◽  
Rachel Y.-W. Chang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Particle Size ◽  
Size Distribution ◽  
Secondary Organic Aerosol ◽  
Canadian Arctic ◽  
Particle Growth ◽  
Organic Aerosol ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Canadian Arctic Archipelago ◽  
Size Distributions ◽  
Fractional Error

Abstract. Summertime Arctic aerosol size distributions are strongly controlled by natural regional emissions. Within this context, we use a chemical transport model with size-resolved aerosol microphysics (GEOS-Chem-TOMAS) to interpret measurements of aerosol size distributions from the Canadian Arctic Archipelago during the summer of 2016, as part of the NETwork on Climate and Aerosols: addressing key uncertainties in Remote Canadian Environments (NETCARE). Our simulations suggest that condensation of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) from precursor vapors emitted in the Arctic and near Arctic marine (open ocean and coastal) regions plays a key role in particle growth events that shape the aerosol size distributions observed at Alert (82.5° N, 62.3° W), Eureka (80.1° N, 86.4° W), and along a NETCARE ship track within the Archipelago. We refer to this SOA as Arctic marine SOA (Arctic MSOA) to reflect the Arctic marine-based and likely biogenic sources for the precursors of the condensing organic vapors. Arctic MSOA from a simulated flux (500 μg m−2 d−1, north of 50° N) of precursor vapors (assumed yield of unity) reduces the summertime particle size distribution model-observation mean fractional error by 2- to 4-fold, relative to a simulation without this Arctic MSOA. Particle growth due to the condensable organic vapor flux contributes strongly (30–50 %) to the simulated summertime-mean number of particles with diameters larger than 20 nm in the study region, and couples with ternary particle nucleation (sulfuric acid, ammonia, and water vapor) and biogenic sulfate condensation to account for more than 90 % of this simulated particle number, a strong biogenic influence. The simulated fit to summertime size-distribution observations is further improved at Eureka and for the ship track by scaling up the nucleation rate by a factor of 100 to account for other particle precursors such as gas-phase iodine and/or amines and/or fragmenting primary particles that could be missing from our simulations. Additionally, the fits to observed size distributions and total aerosol number concentrations for particles larger than 4 nm improve with the assumption that the Arctic MSOA contains semi-volatile species; reducing model-observation mean fractional error by 2- to 3-fold for the Alert and ship track size distributions. Arctic MSOA accounts for more than half of the simulated total particulate organic matter mass concentrations in the summertime Canadian Arctic Archipelago, and this Arctic MSOA has strong simulated summertime pan-Arctic-mean top-of-the-atmosphere aerosol direct (−0.04 W m−2) and cloud-albedo indirect (−0.4 W m−2) radiative effects. Future work should focus on further understanding summertime Arctic sources of Arctic MSOA.

scholarly journals Biogenic and anthropogenic sources of aerosols at the High Arctic site Villum Research Station

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (15) ◽  
pp. 10239-10256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ingeborg E. Nielsen ◽  
Henrik Skov ◽  
Andreas Massling ◽  
Axel C. Eriksson ◽  
Manuel Dall'Osto ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sea Ice ◽  
Organic Aerosol ◽  
High Arctic ◽  
Polar Front ◽  
Anthropogenic Sources ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Research Station ◽  
Aerosol Formation ◽  
Sea Ice Extent ◽  
Arctic Haze

Abstract. There are limited measurements of the chemical composition, abundance and sources of atmospheric particles in the High Arctic To address this, we report 93 d of soot particle aerosol mass spectrometer (SP-AMS) data collected from 20 February to 23 May 2015 at Villum Research Station (VRS) in northern Greenland (81∘36′ N). During this period, we observed the Arctic haze phenomenon with elevated PM1 concentrations ranging from an average of 2.3, 2.3 and 3.3 µg m−3 in February, March and April, respectively, to 1.2 µg m−3 in May. Particulate sulfate (SO42-) accounted for 66 % of the non-refractory PM1 with the highest concentration until the end of April and decreasing in May. The second most abundant species was organic aerosol (OA) (24 %). Both OA and PM1, estimated from the sum of all collected species, showed a marked decrease throughout May in accordance with the polar front moving north, together with changes in aerosol removal processes. The highest refractory black carbon (rBC) concentrations were found in the first month of the campaign, averaging 0.2 µg m−3. In March and April, rBC averaged 0.1 µg m−3 while decreasing to 0.02 µg m−3 in May. Positive matrix factorization (PMF) of the OA mass spectra yielded three factors: (1) a hydrocarbon-like organic aerosol (HOA) factor, which was dominated by primary aerosols and accounted for 12 % of OA mass, (2) an Arctic haze organic aerosol (AOA) factor and (3) a more oxygenated marine organic aerosol (MOA) factor. AOA dominated until mid-April (64 %–81 % of OA), while being nearly absent from the end of May and correlated significantly with SO42-, suggesting the main part of that factor is secondary OA. The MOA emerged late at the end of March, where it increased with solar radiation and reduced sea ice extent and dominated OA for the rest of the campaign until the end of May (24 %–74 % of OA), while AOA was nearly absent. The highest O∕C ratio (0.95) and S∕C ratio (0.011) was found for MOA. Our data support the current understanding that Arctic aerosols are highly influenced by secondary aerosol formation and receives an important contribution from marine emissions during Arctic spring in remote High Arctic areas. In view of a changing Arctic climate with changing sea-ice extent, biogenic processes and corresponding source strengths, highly time-resolved data are needed in order to elucidate the components dominating aerosol concentrations and enhance the understanding of the processes taking place.

scholarly journals Anthropogenic and forest fire pollution aerosol transported to the Arctic: observations from the POLARCAT-France spring campaign

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (14) ◽  
pp. 6437-6454 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Quennehen ◽  
A. Schwarzenboeck ◽  
A. Matsuki ◽  
J. F. Burkhart ◽  
A. Stohl ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Forest Fire ◽  
Biomass Burning ◽  
Forest Fires ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Anthropogenic Emissions ◽  
Size Distributions ◽  
Air Masses ◽  
Accumulation Mode ◽  
First Case

Abstract. During the POLARCAT-France airborne measurement campaign in spring 2008, several pollution plumes transported from mid-latitude regions were encountered. The study presented here focuses on air masses from two different geographic origins (Europe and Asia) and from 2 different source types (anthropogenic pollution and forest fires). A first case study is dedicated to a European air mass, which was repeatedly sampled and analysed during three consecutive days. Thereby, the evolution of the aerosol properties (size distributions, CO mixing ratio) is characterised and related processes are discussed. In particular, the role of coagulation, condensation and cloud processing in the evolution of the Aitken and the accumulation mode particles are contrasted. A second case study focuses on European air masses impacted solely by biomass burning emissions and Asian air masses with contributions from both biomass burning and anthropogenic emissions. The analysis of aerosol modes highlight a similar behaviour for particle originating from biomass burning (from Europe as well as Asia). In comparison to the predominating aged accumulation mode in biomass burning particles, a still larger aerosol accumulation mode related to Asian anthropogenic emissions can be isolated. These findings corroborate the external mixing of such kind of aerosol size distributions. An electron microscopy study (coupled to X-ray elemental analysis) of particles illustrated soot-like inclusions in several samples. Within samples attributed to forest fire sources, the chemical signature is highly associated with the presence of potassium, which is a characteristic tracer element for biomass burning plumes. The single particle images suggest an internal mixing of sampled individual aerosol particles. Thus, particles are found externally mixed as demonstrated from particle size distributions while they appear internally mixed at the particle scale.

scholarly journals Combined retrievals of boreal forest fire aerosol properties with a polarimeter and lidar

2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 7909-7969 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Knobelspiesse ◽  
B. Cairns ◽  
M. Ottaviani ◽  
R. Ferrare ◽  
J. Hair ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Vertical Distribution ◽  
Boreal Forest ◽  
Optical Depth ◽  
Forest Fire ◽  
Optimal Estimation ◽  
Number Concentration ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Estimation Methods ◽  
Initial Value ◽  
Initial Values

Abstract. Absorbing aerosols play an important, but uncertain, role in the global climate. Much of this uncertainty is due to a lack of adequate aerosol measurements. The Aerosol Polarimetery Sensor (APS), which is on the NASA Glory satellite scheduled for launch in the spring of 2011, is designed to help resolve this issue by making accurate, multi-spectral, multi-angle polarized observations. Field observations with the Research Scanning Polarimeter (RSP, the APS airborne prototype), however, have established that simultaneous retrievals of aerosol absorption and vertical distribution over bright land surfaces are quite uncertain. We test a merger of RSP and High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL) data with observations of boreal forest fire smoke, collected during the Arctic Research of the Composition of the Troposphere from Aircraft and Satellites (ARCTAS). During ARCTAS, the RSP and HSRL instruments were mounted on the same aircraft, and validation data were provided by instruments on an aircraft flying a coordinated flight pattern. We found that the lidar data did indeed improve aerosol retrievals using an optimal estimation method, although not primarily because of the contraints imposed on the aerosol vertical distribution. The more useful piece of information from the HSRL was the total column aerosol optical depth, which was used to select the initial value (optimization starting point) of the aerosol number concentration. When ground based sun photometer network climatologies of number concentration were used as an initial value, we found that roughly half of the retrievals had unrealistic sizes and imaginary indices, even though the retrieved spectral optical depths agreed within uncertainties to independent observations. The convergence to an unrealistic local minimum by the optimal estimator is related to the relatively low sensitivity to particles smaller than 0.1 µm at large optical thicknesses. Thus, optimization algorithms used for operational APS retrievals of the fine mode size distribution, when the total optical depth is large, will require initial values generated from table look-ups that exclude unrealistic size/complex index mixtures. External constraints from lidar on initial values used in the optimal estimation methods will also be valuable in reducing the likelihood of obtaining spurious retrievals.

scholarly journals DEVELOPMENT OF THE BRICAN TD100 SMALL UAS AND PAYLOAD TRIALS

2015 ◽  
Vol XL-1/W4 ◽  
pp. 143-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Eggleston ◽  
B. McLuckie ◽  
W. R. Koski ◽  
D. Bird ◽  
C. Patterson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Forest Fire ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Fire Research ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Ir Camera ◽  
Bowhead Whales ◽  
Engine Version ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Made In

The Brican TD100 is a high performance, small UAS designed and made in Brampton Ontario Canada. The concept was defined in late 2009 and it is designed for a maximum weight of 25 kg which is now the accepted cut-off defining small civil UASs. A very clean tractor propeller layout is used with a lightweight composite structure and a high aspect ratio wing to obtain good range and endurance. The design features and performance of the initial electrically powered version are discussed and progress with developing a multifuel engine version is described. The system includes features enabling operation beyond line of sight (BLOS) and the proving missions are described. The vehicle has been used for aerial photography and low cost mapping using a professional grade Nikon DSLR camera. For forest fire research a FLIR A65 IR camera was used, while for georeferenced mapping a new Applanix AP20 system was calibrated with the Nikon camera. The sorties to be described include forest fire research, wildlife photography of bowhead whales in the Arctic and surveys of endangered caribou in a remote area of Labrador, with all these applications including the DSLR camera.

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