Atmospheric Trajectory and Chemical Transport Modelling for Elevated Ozone Events in Denmark

Alexander Mahura, Roman Nuterman, Irina Petrova, Bjarne Amstrup

Danish Meteorological Institute, DMI, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Danish Meteorological Institute, DMI, Copenhagen, Denmark&Tomsk State University, TSU, Tomsk, Russia.
Russian State Hydrometeorological University, RSHU, St. Petersburg, Russia&Now at University of Hamburg, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany.

DOI: 10.4236/acs.2013.31011                

Abstract

In this study, three Danish sites having the longest (1990-2004) time-series of ozone measurements were analysed on inter-annual, monthly and diurnal cycle variability as well as elevated and lowered ozone concentration events were identified. The atmospheric trajectory (HYSPLIT) and dispersion (HIRLAM + CAMx) models were employed to study dominating atmospheric transport patterns associated with elevated events and to evaluate spatio-temporal variability of ozone specific episode and typical seasonal patterns for Denmark. It was found that generally inter-annual variability has a positive trend, and events with low ozone concentration (≤10 μg/m³) continued to diminish. On a monthly scale, the highest and lowest mean concentrations are observed in May and November-December, respectively. The elevated concentrations (≥120 μg/m³) are observed during March-September. On a diurnal cycle, it is observed mostly during 13-16 of local time, and more frequent (ten-fold) compared with nighttime-early morning hours. For ozone elevated events, several sectors (or pathways of atmospheric transport) were identified depending on the sites’ positions, showing the largest (39%) number of such events associated with the north-western sector, and lowest (13% each)—southwestern and northern sectors. For each site, less than 60 events showed very high concentrations (≥180 μg/m³). Among 12 episodes, one longest elevated episode (19-21 Jun 2000) simultaneously registered at all sites and characterized by dominating transport from the south-southwestern sector, low wind speed, clear-sky, and multiple inversions was studied using modelling tools. For this episode, both measurements and modeling (trajectory and dispersion) results showed a relatively good agreement.

Keywords

Elevated Ozone Concentration Event and Episode; Atmospheric Trajectory; Chemical Transport Modeling; HYSPLIT; HIRLAM; CAMx

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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