Concentrations and source regions of light-absorbing particles in snow/ice in northern Pakistan and their impact on snow albedo

Gul, Chaman; Puppala, Siva Praveen; Kang, Shichang; Adhikary, Bhupesh; Zhang, Yulan; Ali, Shaukat; Li, Yang; Li, Xiaofei

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4981-2018

Articles | Volume 18, issue 7

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4981-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4981-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 7

Research article

|

12 Apr 2018

Research article |

| 12 Apr 2018

Concentrations and source regions of light-absorbing particles in snow/ice in northern Pakistan and their impact on snow albedo

Chaman Gul, Siva Praveen Puppala, Shichang Kang, Bhupesh Adhikary, Yulan Zhang, Shaukat Ali, Yang Li, and Xiaofei Li

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Final revised paper (published on 12 Apr 2018)
Supplement to the final revised paper
Preprint (discussion started on 28 Aug 2017)
Supplement to the preprint

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

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

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- Supplement

RC1: 'review of Gul et al.', Anonymous Referee #2, 26 Sep 2017
- AC1: 'Response to reviewer 2 comments', Chaman Gul, 10 Jan 2018
SC1: 'Minor comment', Cenlin He, 19 Oct 2017
- AC2: 'Response of short Comments', Chaman Gul, 10 Jan 2018
RC2: 'Review comments for acp-2017-667', Anonymous Referee #1, 14 Nov 2017
- AC3: 'Response to Reviewer 1 Comments', Chaman Gul, 10 Jan 2018

Peer-review completion

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

AR by Chaman Gul on behalf of the Authors (10 Jan 2018)

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (20 Jan 2018) by Robert McLaren

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (05 Feb 2018)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

The authors have provided a comprehensive response to concerns raised by the reviewers on the first submission of this manuscript. Overall, I think the authors have adequately addressed these concerns, though the following issues should be addressed prior to publication:

- The paper needs to be carefully and thoroughly edited for grammar and clarity. Reading only the quoted passages of edited text in the response to reviewers document, I see numerous instances of incomplete sentences, incorrect grammar, and unclear descriptions.

- One question I initially raised was whether the reported albedo reductions are absolute or relative. The authors explained their calculations and describe them as "relative" changes, but I think they are actually "absolute" changes in the context I was inquiring about. I wasn't completely clear on the distinction, however, so I will clarify here what I meant. Let's say two albedo measurements are 0.70 and 0.80. The absolute difference between these could be reported as 0.10 or 10%. The relative change could be reported as: (0.80-0.70)/0.70 = 14%. Hence when I see "albedo change" reported with a "%", I don't know if it is the absolute change or relative change. I believe the authors are reporting absolute change and if so they should clarify this. Simply reporting the change in absolute albedo units (e.g., +0.10) usually negates this problem and is what I usually advise doing.

- With regard to the possibility of dust contamination of BC/OC measurements (an issue raised in my first review), the following addition to the paper is quoted several times: "According to our understanding the analysis method and amount of dust loading on the sample can also alter OC/BC ratios." I am glad to see the authors acknowledge this potential source of contamination, but I suggest they elaborate on this with a couple of additional sentences, for the benefit of readers. Specifically, I suggest explaining why dust can result in over-estimations of BC/OC burdens, citing one or papers to this effect, and if possible mentioning the potential magnitudes of overestimation that may occur.

- The following sentence was added to the revised manuscript (quoted in the response to reviewers): "Warming role of OC was also not included in the current research, which was low but significant in several regions (Yasunari et al. 2015)." It is not clear to me what this means, so I request that this be clarified. Is it meant that albedo reduction from OC was not quantified here?

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ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (20 Feb 2018) by Robert McLaren

AR by Chaman Gul on behalf of the Authors (01 Mar 2018) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (08 Mar 2018) by Robert McLaren

AR by Chaman Gul on behalf of the Authors (16 Mar 2018) Author's response Manuscript

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Short summary

Snow and ice samples were collected from six glaciers and multiple mountain valleys from northern Pakistan. Samples were analyzed for black carbon and water-insoluble organic carbon. Relatively high concentrations of black carbon, organic carbon, and dust were reported. Snow albedo and radiative forcing were estimated for the snow samples. Possible source regions of pollutants were identified through various techniques.