ACP Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ACP Atmos. Chem. Phys. 1680-7324 Copernicus Publications Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/acp-11-11647-2011 Effects of model resolution on the interpretation of satellite NO<sub>2</sub> observations Valin L. C. 1 Russell A. R. 1 Hudman R. C. 1 3 Cohen R. C. 1 2 College of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA now at: Environmental Protection Agency, Region 9, San Francisco, CA 94105, USA 22 11 2011 11 22 11647 11655 Copyright: © 2011 L. C. Valin et al. 2011 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is available from https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/11/11647/2011/acp-11-11647-2011.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/11/11647/2011/acp-11-11647-2011.pdf

Inference of NO<sub>x</sub> emissions (NO+NO<sub>2</sub>) from satellite observations of tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> column requires knowledge of NO<sub>x</sub> lifetime, usually provided by chemical transport models (CTMs). However, it is known that species subject to non-linear sources or sinks, such as ozone, are susceptible to biases in coarse-resolution CTMs. Here we compute the resolution-dependent bias in predicted NO<sub>2</sub> column, a quantity relevant to the interpretation of space-based observations. We use 1-D and 2-D models to illustrate the mechanisms responsible for these biases over a range of NO<sub>2</sub> concentrations and model resolutions. We find that predicted biases are largest at coarsest model resolutions with negative biases predicted over large sources and positive biases predicted over small sources. As an example, we use WRF-CHEM to illustrate the resolution necessary to predict 10 AM and 1 PM NO<sub>2</sub> column to 10 and 25% accuracy over three large sources, the Four Corners power plants in NW New Mexico, Los Angeles, and the San Joaquin Valley in California for a week-long simulation in July 2006. We find that resolution in the range of 4–12 km is sufficient to accurately model nonlinear effects in the NO<sub>2</sub> loss rate.

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