Contributions of transported Prudhoe Bay oil field emissions to the aerosol population in Utqiaġvik, Alaska

Gunsch, Matthew J.; Kirpes, Rachel M.; Kolesar, Katheryn R.; Barrett, Tate E.; China, Swarup; Sheesley, Rebecca J.; Laskin, Alexander; Wiedensohler, Alfred; Tuch, Thomas; Pratt, Kerri A.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10879-2017

Articles | Volume 17, issue 17

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10879-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10879-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 17, issue 17

Research article

|

14 Sep 2017

Research article |

| 14 Sep 2017

Contributions of transported Prudhoe Bay oil field emissions to the aerosol population in Utqiaġvik, Alaska

Matthew J. Gunsch, Rachel M. Kirpes, Katheryn R. Kolesar, Tate E. Barrett, Swarup China, Rebecca J. Sheesley, Alexander Laskin, Alfred Wiedensohler, Thomas Tuch, and Kerri A. Pratt

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Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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RC1: 'Review for Gunsch et al.', Anonymous Referee #1, 05 Jun 2017
- AC1: 'Rsponse to Referee #1', Kerri Pratt, 29 Jul 2017
RC2: 'Review of "Contributions of Transported Prudhoe Bay Oilfield Emissions to the Aerosol Population in Utqiaġvik, Alaska"', Anonymous Referee #2, 04 Jul 2017
- AC2: 'Response to Referee #2', Kerri Pratt, 29 Jul 2017

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AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by Kerri Pratt on behalf of the Authors (29 Jul 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Reconsider after minor revisions (Editor review) (07 Aug 2017) by Eleanor Browne

Dear Authors:
Thank you for your consideration of the referees' comments. Please address the following comments prior to publication.

Page 5 line 5 "...background Arctic aerosol combustion." Do the authors mean aerosol composition?

Page 10 line 26: Was Kolesar et al (2017) based on one year or multiple years? Does the data analyzed in that work overlap with the data presented here? Regardless, please state the time period that the Kolesar et al. (2017) work covers.

Sect. 3.1 The 2015 measurements attributed to Prudhoe Bay (Fig. 2) are quite different from the 2008, 2009, 2013, an 2014 (Fig. 3) measurements. In particular, the average distribution between 20-30 nm is much larger in 2015 and lies beyond the 75th percentile in the multi-year measurements. Is there any indication as to what drives this difference?

Page 12 line 6-8: Sierau et al. (2014) suggest options for a "missing" ATOFMS particle type other than pure ammonium sulfate such as organic particles of biological origin. Please expand the description of Sierau et al. (2014) to represent the discussion presented in that paper. Please address how that discussion relates to the results presented here. It may be worth considering moving this to Sect. 3.2.1.

Page 16 line 4-5: For the CCSEM-EDX data the sulfur-rich particles are also important and greater than fresh SSA in some of the size bins from 0.13-0.4 um.

Page 16 line 17: "...potential to grow..." It may be prudent to re-emphasize how growth was not observed in this work.

Figure 2: Please include 10 nm on the x-axis (as is done in Figure 3)

Figure 6: Please consider including a histogram showing the number of particles analyzed in each bin. Alternatively, this may be provided in the supplement.

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Page 1 line 16: -93/95 should be NaCl2-

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AR by Kerri Pratt on behalf of the Authors (12 Aug 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (14 Aug 2017) by Eleanor Browne

AR by Kerri Pratt on behalf of the Authors (15 Aug 2017)

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Short summary

Arctic sea ice loss is leading to increasing petroleum extraction and shipping. It is necessary to identify emissions from these activities for improved Arctic air quality and climate assessment. Atmospheric particles were measured from August to September 2015 in Utqiaġvik, AK. For periods influenced by Prudhoe Bay, significant influence associated with combustion emissions was observed, compared to fresh sea spray influence during Arctic Ocean periods.