Investigation of new particle formation at the  summit of Mt. Tai, China

Lv, Ganglin; Sui, Xiao; Chen, Jianmin; Jayaratne, Rohan; Mellouki, Abdelwahid

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-2243-2018

Articles | Volume 18, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-2243-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Special issue:

Regional transport and transformation of air pollution in...

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-2243-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 3

Research article

|

15 Feb 2018

Research article |

| 15 Feb 2018

Investigation of new particle formation at the summit of Mt. Tai, China

Ganglin Lv, Xiao Sui, Jianmin Chen, Rohan Jayaratne, and Abdelwahid Mellouki

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Final revised paper (published on 15 Feb 2018)
Preprint (discussion started on 24 Oct 2016)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

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

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RC1: 'Comments on “Investigation of new particle formation at the summit of Mt. Tai, China”', Anonymous Referee #2, 06 Nov 2016
- AC1: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #1, Ganglin Lv et al.', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016
- AC3: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #1, Ganglin Lv, Revised manuscript', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016
- AC4: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #2, Ganglin Lv et al.', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016
- AC5: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #2, Ganglin Lv et al, revised manuscript', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016
RC2: 'Comments on Ganglin Lv et al.', Anonymous Referee #1, 09 Nov 2016
- AC2: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #2, Ganglin Lv et al.', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016
- AC6: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #1，Ganglin Lv et al.', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016
- AC7: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #1, Ganglin Lv et al. Revised manuscript', Jianmin Chen, 19 Dec 2016

Peer-review completion

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

AR by Jianmin Chen on behalf of the Authors (21 Dec 2016) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (23 Dec 2016) by Renyi Zhang

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (06 Feb 2017)

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (19 Feb 2017)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

Comments on “Investigation of new particle formation at the summit of Mt. Tai, China”

The revised manuscript is much better than its original version. The language is much more appropriate and the discussion is clear and organized. However, though the study provide some very valuable data regarding to new particle formation at a mountain site, there is still lack of deep analysis in the current manuscript. The conclusions are either common understanding in the field of NPF or without strong evidence. A major revision should be made before publication is considered.

Comments include:

1. The authors discussed in the manuscript about the influence of O3 concentration on NPF frequency. But the O3 data shown in figure 4 seems strange. Why the O3 concentration kept stable at a high level before Nov. 17th, 2014? Why there is no diurnal variation these days? Is the O3 data trustable? Besides, it is better to provide PM2.5 data in Figure 4.

2. In part 3.2.3, the authors argue that “the gas point sources from the above two directions can increase the probability of the NPF occurrence in a certain extent”. Could the authors provide some more evidence, e.g., SO2 concentration, to prove this statement?

3. Also in part 3.2.3, the authors attribute the high frequency of NPF in Mongolia air mass to “transported air masses brought high level of anthropogenic precursors from the polluted areas”. Is there clear evidence on this, e.g., higher SO2 and PM2.5? Or could it due to the low aerosol loading caused by the long range air masses?

4. Page 5, line 23, “and the frequent occurrence…”. Is there a “highest” before the” frequent occurrence”?

5. Page 8, line 11, should “might be explained that…” be “might be explained by …”?

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ED: Reconsider after major revisions (18 Mar 2017) by Renyi Zhang

AR by Jianmin Chen on behalf of the Authors (28 Apr 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (30 Apr 2017) by Renyi Zhang

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (02 May 2017)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

This manuscript is currently much better presented than the previous one. It can be accepted for publication in ACP after minor revision.

1. the author still hasn’t proven the accuracy of O3 data. There is no diurnal variation of O3 in the first few days, but very strong variation in the following days. On contrary, the PM2.5 and SO2 concentrations varied greatly in the first few days. The author discussed about the high NO2 concentration in the first few days, which is not provided. Is the NO2 also as stable as O3?

2. Page 2, line 24，another paper which summarized the NPF at diversified sites in China is recommended here.
Peng, J. F., Hu, M., Wang, Z. B., Huang, X. F., Kumar, P., Wu, Z. J., Guo, S., Yue, D. L., Shang, D. J., Zheng, Z., and He, L. Y.: Submicron aerosols at thirteen diversified sites in China: size distribution, new particle formation and corresponding contribution to cloud condensation nuclei production, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 10249-10265, doi:10.5194/acp-14-10249-2014, 2014.

3. It is not quite convictive when the author discussed “factors affecting the occurrence of NPF” only by comparing the averaging values of each factor at NPF and non-NPF days. For example, on page 10, the author attribute the low O3 concentration on NPF days to the “negative accompanying pollutants”. However, such expression is strange. As far as I know, on one ever found a “negative influence” of O3 on NPF before. The author could just explain this as co-linear with some other pollutants, instead of the “negative influence”. Also, some

4. Fig.1, it is better to provide error bars for each data point.

5. Fig.7, it is not very clear what the SO2 bars stand for here unless spend some time to find out. It is recommended to the author to change some other way to express the SO2 concentration.

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RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (31 Jul 2017)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

In this manuscript, particle number size distributions at a mountain site of China were measured using two techniques. The data is useful to provide information on new particle formation under mountainous environment. Other data, i.e. meteorological conditions, gaseous pollutants, PM chemical composition, were assist to analyze the new particle formation. However, there are still some crucial issues required to address. I suggest that the manuscript should be major revised before published in ACP.
1. The introduction is insufficient. Nucleation and growth not only has great impact on climate (CCN here in the manuscript, also radiation forcing Kazil et al., ACP, 2010), but also air quality (i.e. haze, Guo et al. PNAS 2014), and human health (. Nucleation mechanism, the roles of different precursors, sulfuric acid, ammonium, amine, organics (recent Nature papers). Also, there were several mountain site NPF studies in the world. The authors should review these studies, not only the ones in China.
2. My biggest concern about the measurement is that can NAIS and WPS data well combine together. Two instruments have overlap data bins. How’s the data? Do they agree well? If not, how to combine them? As far as I know, these two techniques usually don’t agree very well.
3. The estimation of Sulfuric acid proxy. The method itself already has large uncertainty. Moreover, the radiation used here is from HYSPLIT model. HYSPLIT model cannot accurately model the radiation for single site. This caused even larger uncertainty.
4. 3.2.1 and 3.2.2 seem talk about the similar things.
5. Fig.2 I can’t see any relationship during NPF days.
6. Please explain why NPF prefer low temperature. I cannot figure out the mechanism here. Correlation doesn’t mean relationship
7. The NPF has nothing to do with wind speed and direction. It’s no use to analyze this. The real reason for this is the relationship between source (sulfuric acid) and sink (CS).
8. Fig. 6 I cannot see any difference for NPF and non-NPF.
9. The “haze” here is odd. I don’t think this session makes aby sense.

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ED: Reconsider after major revisions (14 Aug 2017) by Renyi Zhang

AR by Jianmin Chen on behalf of the Authors (26 Sep 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (27 Sep 2017) by Renyi Zhang

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (04 Oct 2017)

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (09 Nov 2017)

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (13 Nov 2017) by Renyi Zhang

My overall feeling with your manuscript is that it provides little physical insight into the issue of NPF from your field measurements. For example, you concluded that the O3 concentration was lower during NPF events, but indicated that the continental air masses passing through more polluted areas may contribute to an increased frequency of NPF events. Such statements are self-contradicting. Also, you concluded that the continental air masses passing through more polluted areas (denoted as Type І) could enhance the occurrence of NPF, which was possibly associated with high level of precursors carried from the polluted regions. However, no discussion was provided for any species that likely contributed to such enhanced NPF. For example, it has been shown that sulfuric acid likely plays a key role in NPF in China (The roles of sulfuric acid in new particle formation and growth in the mega-city of Beijing, Atmos. Chem. Phys. 10, 4953, 2010). Also, organic species can also enhance NPF (Atmospheric new particle formation enhanced by organic acids, Science 304, 1487, 2004). Those aspects need to be assessed in your manuscript.
Also, the statement “Field observations of NPF at the mountain-top sites are scarce in China, and the results of such studies could significantly contribute to atmospheric aerosol pollution control” was unsubstantiated on the basis of your research.
In addition, one of the reviewers still suggested to improve the writing of your manuscript, which I agree with. I provide a few examples below for the English issues.
In the abstract, change “in a period” to “during a period”. Also, please fix the phrase “were mainly through affecting”. Add an article “the” before “maritime air mass”. Change “seemed not to be favorable” to “did not correspond to a favorable”.
P. 13, line 27, please fix the phrase “an increased the frequency of NPF events”.

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AR by Jianmin Chen on behalf of the Authors (26 Dec 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (05 Jan 2018) by Renyi Zhang

AR by Jianmin Chen on behalf of the Authors (10 Jan 2018)

Short summary

We conducted an investigation of new particle formation (NPF) at the summit of Mt. Tai, eastern China, based on simultaneous measurements of particle size distribution, meteorological parameters, gaseous species, mass concentration, and chemical composition of PM_2.5. The general characteristics, favorable conditions, and potential precursor species of NPF events are discussed. An in-depth study of NPF on Mt. Tai is important for understanding the effect of particles on air quality.