Global and regional effects of the photochemistry of CH₃O₂NO₂: evidence from ARCTAS

Abstract. Using measurements from the NASA Arctic Research of the Composition of the Troposphere from Aircraft and Satellites (ARCTAS) experiment, we show that methyl peroxy nitrate (CH₃O₂NO₂) is present in concentrations of ~5–15 pptv in the springtime arctic upper troposphere. We investigate the regional and global effects of CH₃O₂NO₂ by including its chemistry in the GEOS-Chem 3-D global chemical transport model. We find that at temperatures below 240 K inclusion of CH₃O₂NO₂ chemistry results in decreases of up to ~20 % in NO_x, ~20 % in N₂O₅, ~5 % in HNO₃, ~2 % in ozone, and increases in methyl hydrogen peroxide of up to ~14 %. Larger changes are observed in biomass burning plumes lofted to high altitude. Additionally, by sequestering NO_x at low temperatures, CH₃O₂NO₂ decreases the cycling of HO₂ to OH, resulting in a larger upper tropospheric HO₂ to OH ratio. These results may impact some estimates of lightning NO_x sources as well as help explain differences between models and measurements of upper tropospheric composition.