Articles | Volume 20, issue 12
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 7271–7290, 2020
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-7271-2020
© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 7271–7290, 2020
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-7271-2020
© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Research article 23 Jun 2020
Research article | 23 Jun 2020
The increasing atmospheric burden of the greenhouse gas sulfur hexafluoride (SF6)
Peter G. Simmonds et al.
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Jens Mühle, Cathy M. Trudinger, Luke M. Western, Matthew Rigby, Martin K. Vollmer, Sunyoung Park, Alistair J. Manning, Daniel Say, Anita Ganesan, L. Paul Steele, Diane J. Ivy, Tim Arnold, Shanlan Li, Andreas Stohl, Christina M. Harth, Peter K. Salameh, Archie McCulloch, Simon O'Doherty, Mi-Kyung Park, Chun Ok Jo, Dickon Young, Kieran M. Stanley, Paul B. Krummel, Blagoj Mitrevski, Ove Hermansen, Chris Lunder, Nikolaos Evangeliou, Bo Yao, Jooil Kim, Benjamin Hmiel, Christo Buizert, Vasilii V. Petrenko, Jgor Arduini, Michela Maione, David M. Etheridge, Eleni Michalopoulou, Mike Czerniak, Jeffrey P. Severinghaus, Stefan Reimann, Peter G. Simmonds, Paul J. Fraser, Ronald G. Prinn, and Ray F. Weiss
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 10335–10359, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-10335-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-10335-2019, 2019
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We discuss atmospheric concentrations and emissions of the strong greenhouse gas perfluorocyclobutane. A large fraction of recent emissions stem from China, India, and Russia, probably as a by-product from the production of fluoropolymers and fluorochemicals. Most historic emissions likely stem from developed countries. Total emissions are higher than what is being reported. Clearly, more measurements and better reporting are needed to understand emissions of this and other greenhouse gases.
David D. Parrish, Richard G. Derwent, Simon O'Doherty, and Peter G. Simmonds
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 12, 3383–3394, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3383-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3383-2019, 2019
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We present a flexible method that employs a power series expansion and Fourier series analysis to characterize the average long-term change and seasonal cycle, respectively, from a time series of observations of a trace atmospheric species. This approach maximizes the statistically significant information derived, including non-linear aspects of the long-term trends, without over fitting the data. Generally, a small set of parameter values (e.g., 7 or 8) provides this characterization.
Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, Jgor Arduini, Tim Arnold, H. Langley DeWitt, Paul J. Fraser, Anita L. Ganesan, Jimmy Gasore, Christina M. Harth, Ove Hermansen, Jooil Kim, Paul B. Krummel, Shanlan Li, Zoë M. Loh, Chris R. Lunder, Michela Maione, Alistair J. Manning, Ben R. Miller, Blagoj Mitrevski, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Sunyoung Park, Stefan Reimann, Matt Rigby, Takuya Saito, Peter K. Salameh, Roland Schmidt, Peter G. Simmonds, L. Paul Steele, Martin K. Vollmer, Ray H. Wang, Bo Yao, Yoko Yokouchi, Dickon Young, and Lingxi Zhou
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 10, 985–1018, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-985-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-985-2018, 2018
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We present the data and accomplishments of the multinational global atmospheric measurement program AGAGE (Advanced Global Atmospheric Gases Experiment). At high frequency and at multiple sites, AGAGE measures all the important chemicals in the Montreal Protocol for the protection of the ozone layer and the non-carbon-dioxide gases assessed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. AGAGE uses these data to estimate sources and sinks of all these gases and has operated since 1978.
Peter G. Simmonds, Matthew Rigby, Archie McCulloch, Martin K. Vollmer, Stephan Henne, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Alistair J. Manning, Paul B. Krummel, Paul J. Fraser, Dickon Young, Ray F. Weiss, Peter K. Salameh, Christina M. Harth, Stefan Reimann, Cathy M. Trudinger, L. Paul Steele, Ray H. J. Wang, Diane J. Ivy, Ronald G. Prinn, Blagoj Mitrevski, and David M. Etheridge
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 4153–4169, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4153-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4153-2018, 2018
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Recent measurements of the potent greenhouse gas HFC-23, a by-product of HCFC-22 production, show a 28 % increase in the atmospheric mole fraction from 2009 to 2016. A minimum in the atmospheric abundance of HFC-23 in 2009 was attributed to abatement of HFC-23 emissions by incineration under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). Our results indicate that the recent increase in HFC-23 emissions is driven by failure of mitigation under the CDM to keep pace with increased HCFC-22 production.
Kieran M. Stanley, Aoife Grant, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Alistair J. Manning, Ann R. Stavert, T. Gerard Spain, Peter K. Salameh, Christina M. Harth, Peter G. Simmonds, William T. Sturges, David E. Oram, and Richard G. Derwent
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 11, 1437–1458, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-1437-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-1437-2018, 2018
Martin K. Vollmer, Dickon Young, Cathy M. Trudinger, Jens Mühle, Stephan Henne, Matthew Rigby, Sunyoung Park, Shanlan Li, Myriam Guillevic, Blagoj Mitrevski, Christina M. Harth, Benjamin R. Miller, Stefan Reimann, Bo Yao, L. Paul Steele, Simon A. Wyss, Chris R. Lunder, Jgor Arduini, Archie McCulloch, Songhao Wu, Tae Siek Rhee, Ray H. J. Wang, Peter K. Salameh, Ove Hermansen, Matthias Hill, Ray L. Langenfelds, Diane Ivy, Simon O'Doherty, Paul B. Krummel, Michela Maione, David M. Etheridge, Lingxi Zhou, Paul J. Fraser, Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, and Peter G. Simmonds
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 979–1002, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-979-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-979-2018, 2018
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We measured the three chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) CFC-13, CFC-114, and CFC-115 in the atmosphere because they are important in stratospheric ozone depletion. These compounds should have decreased in the atmosphere because they are banned by the Montreal Protocol but we find the opposite. Emissions over the last decade have not declined on a global scale. We use inverse modeling and our observations to find that a large part of the emissions originate in the Asian region.
Peter G. Simmonds, Matthew Rigby, Archie McCulloch, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Jens Mühle, Paul B. Krummel, Paul Steele, Paul J. Fraser, Alistair J. Manning, Ray F. Weiss, Peter K. Salameh, Chris M. Harth, Ray H. J. Wang, and Ronald G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 4641–4655, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-4641-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-4641-2017, 2017
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This paper reports how long-term atmospheric measurements demonstrate that the Montreal Protocol has been effective in controlling production and consumption of the hydrochlorofluorocarbons, a group of industrial chemicals that have detrimental effects on the ozone layer and also contribute to global warming as greenhouse gases and their hydrofluorocarbon substitutes which are also potent greenhouse gases but do not materially affect the ozone layer.
Martyn P. Chipperfield, Qing Liang, Matthew Rigby, Ryan Hossaini, Stephen A. Montzka, Sandip Dhomse, Wuhu Feng, Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, Christina M. Harth, Peter K. Salameh, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Peter G. Simmonds, Paul B. Krummel, Paul J. Fraser, L. Paul Steele, James D. Happell, Robert C. Rhew, James Butler, Shari A. Yvon-Lewis, Bradley Hall, David Nance, Fred Moore, Ben R. Miller, James W. Elkins, Jeremy J. Harrison, Chris D. Boone, Elliot L. Atlas, and Emmanuel Mahieu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 15741–15754, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-15741-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-15741-2016, 2016
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Carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) is a compound which, when released into the atmosphere, can cause depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer. Its emissions are controlled under the Montreal Protocol, and its atmospheric abundance is slowly decreasing. However, this decrease is not as fast as expected based on estimates of its emissions and its atmospheric lifetime. We have used an atmospheric model to look at the uncertainties in the CCl4 lifetime and to examine the impact on its atmospheric decay.
Francesco Graziosi, Jgor Arduini, Paolo Bonasoni, Francesco Furlani, Umberto Giostra, Alistair J. Manning, Archie McCulloch, Simon O'Doherty, Peter G. Simmonds, Stefan Reimann, Martin K. Vollmer, and Michela Maione
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 12849–12859, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-12849-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-12849-2016, 2016
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Carbon tetrachloride is an ozone-depleting greenhouse gas banned under the Montreal Protocol. Measurements of atmospheric levels combined with global transport models indicate that it is still being emitted, in contrast to what is reported. In order to help solve the "mystery of carbon tetrachloride", we estimated European emissions during 2006–2014 using atmospheric observations and models. We identified emission hot spots and showed inconsistencies in national emission declarations.
P. G. Simmonds, M. Rigby, A. J. Manning, M. F. Lunt, S. O'Doherty, A. McCulloch, P. J. Fraser, S. Henne, M. K. Vollmer, J. Mühle, R. F. Weiss, P. K. Salameh, D. Young, S. Reimann, A. Wenger, T. Arnold, C. M. Harth, P. B. Krummel, L. P. Steele, B. L. Dunse, B. R. Miller, C. R. Lunder, O. Hermansen, N. Schmidbauer, T. Saito, Y. Yokouchi, S. Park, S. Li, B. Yao, L. X. Zhou, J. Arduini, M. Maione, R. H. J. Wang, D. Ivy, and R. G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 365–382, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-365-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-365-2016, 2016
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We report regional and global emissions estimates of HFC-152a using high frequency measurements from 11 observing sites and archived air samples dating back to 1978 together with atmospheric transport models. The "bottom-up" emissions of HFC-152a reported to the UNFCCC appear to significantly underestimate those reported here from observations. This discrepancy we suggest arises from largely underestimated USA and undeclared Asian emissions.
S. O'Doherty, M. Rigby, J. Mühle, D. J. Ivy, B. R. Miller, D. Young, P. G. Simmonds, S. Reimann, M. K. Vollmer, P. B. Krummel, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, B. Dunse, P. K. Salameh, C. M. Harth, T. Arnold, R. F. Weiss, J. Kim, S. Park, S. Li, C. Lunder, O. Hermansen, N. Schmidbauer, L. X. Zhou, B. Yao, R. H. J. Wang, A. J. Manning, and R. G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 9249–9258, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9249-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9249-2014, 2014
Daniel Say, Alistair J. Manning, Luke M. Western, Dickon Young, Adam Wisher, Matthew Rigby, Stefan Reimann, Martin K. Vollmer, Michela Maione, Jgor Arduini, Paul B. Krummel, Jens Mühle, Christina M. Harth, Brendan Evans, Ray F. Weiss, Ronald G. Prinn, and Simon O'Doherty
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 2149–2164, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-2149-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-2149-2021, 2021
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Perfluorocarbons (PFCs) are potent greenhouse gases with exceedingly long lifetimes. We used atmospheric measurements from a global monitoring network to track the accumulation of these gases in the atmosphere. In the case of the two most abundant PFCs, recent measurements indicate that global emissions are increasing. In Europe, we used a model to estimate regional PFC emissions. Our results show that there was no significant decline in northwest European PFC emissions between 2010 and 2019.
Angharad C. Stell, Luke M. Western, Tomás Sherwen, and Matthew Rigby
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 1717–1736, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-1717-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-1717-2021, 2021
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Although it is the second-most important greenhouse gas, our understanding of the atmospheric-methane budget is limited. The uncertainty highlights the need for new tools to investigate sources and sinks. Here, we use a Gaussian process emulator to efficiently approximate the response of atmospheric-methane observations to changes in the most uncertain emission or loss processes. With this new method, we rigorously quantify the sensitivity of atmospheric observations to budget uncertainties.
Fides Lefrancois, Markus Jesswein, Markus Thoma, Andreas Engel, Kieran Stanley, and Tanja Schuck
Atmos. Meas. Tech. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-2020-488, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-2020-488, 2021
Preprint under review for AMT
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Synthetic halocarbons can contribute to stratospheric ozone depletion or to climate change. In many applications they have been replaced over the last years. The presented non-target analysis shows an application approach to quantify those replacements retrospectively, using recorded data of air measurements with gas chromatography coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry. We focus on the retrospective analysis of the fourth generation halocarbons, detected at Taunus Observatory in Germany.
Masanori Takeda, Hideaki Nakajima, Isao Murata, Tomoo Nagahama, Isamu Morino, Geoffrey C. Toon, Ray F. Weiss, Jens Mühle, Paul B. Krummel, Paul J. Fraser, and Hsiang-Jui Wang
Atmos. Meas. Tech. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-2020-505, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-2020-505, 2021
Preprint under review for AMT
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This paper presents the first observations of atmospheric HFC-23 abundances with a ground-based remote sensing technique. The increasing trend of the HFC-23 abundances analyzed by this study agree with that derived from other existing in-situ measurements. This study indicates that ground-based FTIR observation has a capability for monitoring the trend of atmospheric HFC-23 and would allow for monitoring the distribution of global atmospheric HFC-23 abundances in more detail.
Antoine Berchet, Espen Sollum, Rona L. Thompson, Isabelle Pison, Joël Thanwerdas, Grégoire Broquet, Frédéric Chevallier, Tuula Aalto, Peter Bergamaschi, Dominik Brunner, Richard Engelen, Audrey Fortems-Cheiney, Christoph Gerbig, Christine Groot Zwaaftink, Jean-Matthieu Haussaire, Stephan Henne, Sander Houweling, Ute Karstens, Werner L. Kutsch, Ingrid T. Luijkx, Guillaume Monteil, Paul I. Palmer, Jacob C. A. van Peet, Wouter Peters, Philippe Peylin, Elise Potier, Christian Rödenbeck, Marielle Saunois, Marko Scholze, Aki Tsuruta, and Yuanhong Zhao
Geosci. Model Dev. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-2020-407, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-2020-407, 2020
Preprint under review for GMD
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We present here a Community Inversion Framework (CIF) to help rationalize development efforts and leverage the strengths of individual inversion systems into a comprehensive framework. The CIF is a programming protocol to allow various inversion bricks to be exchanged among researchers.
The ensemble of bricks makes a flexible, transparent and open-source python-based tool. We describe the main structure and functionalities and demonstrate it in a simple academic case.
Ana Maria Roxana Petrescu, Chunjing Qiu, Philippe Ciais, Rona L. Thompson, Philippe Peylin, Matthew J. McGrath, Efisio Solazzo, Greet Janssens-Maenhout, Francesco N. Tubiello, Peter Bergamaschi, Dominik Brunner, Glen P. Peters, Lena Höglund-Isaksson, Pierre Regnier, Ronny Lauerwald, David Bastviken, Aki Tsuruta, Wilfried Winiwarter, Prabir K. Patra, Matthias Kuhnert, Gabriel D. Oreggioni, Monica Crippa, Marielle Saunois, Lucia Perugini, Tiina Markkanen, Tuula Aalto, Christine D. Groot Zwaaftink, Yuanzhi Yao, Chris Wilson, Giulia Conchedda, Dirk Günther, Adrian Leip, Pete Smith, Jean-Matthieu Haussaire, Antti Leppänen, Alistair J. Manning, Joe McNorton, Patrick Brockmann, and Han Dolman
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2020-367, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2020-367, 2020
Revised manuscript accepted for ESSD
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This study is topical and provides a state-of-the-art scientific overview of data availability from bottom-up and top-down CH4 and N2O emissions in the EU27 and UK. The data integrates recent emission inventories with process-based model data and regional/global inversions for the European domain, aiming at reconciling them with official country-level UNFCCC national GHG inventories in support to policy and to facilitate real-time verification procedures.
Michaela I. Hegglin, Susann Tegtmeier, John Anderson, Adam E. Bourassa, Samuel Brohede, Doug Degenstein, Lucien Froidevaux, Bernd Funke, John Gille, Yasuko Kasai, Erkki Kyrölä, Jerry Lumpe, Donal Murtagh, Jessica L. Neu, Kristell Pérot, Ellis Remsberg, Alexey Rozanov, Matthew Toohey, Joachim Urban, Thomas von Clarmann, Kaley A. Walker, Hsiang-Jui Wang, Carlo Arosio, Robert Damadeo, Ryan Fuller, Gretchen Lingenfelser, Christopher McLinden, Diane Pendlebury, Chris Roth, Niall J. Ryan, Christopher Sioris, Lesley Smith, and Katja Weigel
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2020-342, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2020-342, 2020
Revised manuscript accepted for ESSD
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This paper provides an overview of the SPARC Data Initiative, to date the most comprehensive assessment of vertically resolved stratospheric composition measurements spanning the past 4 decades (1979-2018). The measurements of 26 different chemical constituents were obtained from an international suite of space-based limb sounders and compiled into vertically resolved, zonal monthly mean climatologies. Their quality and consistency is discussed based on a range of evaluation diagnostics.
Rachel L. Tunnicliffe, Anita L. Ganesan, Robert J. Parker, Hartmut Boesch, Nicola Gedney, Benjamin Poulter, Zhen Zhang, Jošt V. Lavrič, David Walter, Matthew Rigby, Stephan Henne, Dickon Young, and Simon O'Doherty
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 13041–13067, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13041-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13041-2020, 2020
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This study quantifies Brazil’s emissions of a potent atmospheric greenhouse gas, methane. This is in the field of atmospheric modelling and uses remotely sensed data and surface measurements of methane concentrations as well as an atmospheric transport model to interpret the data. Because of Brazil’s large emissions from wetlands, agriculture and biomass burning, these emissions affect global methane concentrations and thus are of global significance.
Dac-Loc Nguyen, Hendryk Czech, Simone M. Pieber, Jürgen Schnelle-Kreis, Martin Steinbacher, Jürgen Orasche, Stephan Henne, Olga B. Popovicheva, Gülcin Abbaszade, Günter Engling, Nicolas Bukowiecki, Nhat-Anh Nguyen, Xuan-Anh Nguyen, and Ralf Zimmermann
Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-1027, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-1027, 2020
Revised manuscript under review for ACP
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Southeast Asia is well-know for emission-intense and recurring wildfires and after-harvest crop residue burning during pre-monsoon season from February to April. We describe a biomass burning (BB) plume arriving at remote Pha Din meteorological station, outline its carbonaceous particulate matter (PM) constituents based on more than 50 target compounds and discuss possible BB sources. This study add valuable information on chemical PM composition for a region with scarce data availability.
Guillaume Monteil, Grégoire Broquet, Marko Scholze, Matthew Lang, Ute Karstens, Christoph Gerbig, Frank-Thomas Koch, Naomi E. Smith, Rona L. Thompson, Ingrid T. Luijkx, Emily White, Antoon Meesters, Philippe Ciais, Anita L. Ganesan, Alistair Manning, Michael Mischurow, Wouter Peters, Philippe Peylin, Jerôme Tarniewicz, Matt Rigby, Christian Rödenbeck, Alex Vermeulen, and Evie M. Walton
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 12063–12091, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12063-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12063-2020, 2020
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The paper presents the first results from the EUROCOM project, a regional atmospheric inversion intercomparison exercise involving six European research groups. It aims to produce an estimate of the net carbon flux between the European terrestrial ecosystems and the atmosphere for the period 2006–2015, based on constraints provided by observed CO2 concentrations and using inverse modelling techniques. The use of six different models enables us to investigate the robustness of the results.
Malte Meinshausen, Zebedee R. J. Nicholls, Jared Lewis, Matthew J. Gidden, Elisabeth Vogel, Mandy Freund, Urs Beyerle, Claudia Gessner, Alexander Nauels, Nico Bauer, Josep G. Canadell, John S. Daniel, Andrew John, Paul B. Krummel, Gunnar Luderer, Nicolai Meinshausen, Stephen A. Montzka, Peter J. Rayner, Stefan Reimann, Steven J. Smith, Marten van den Berg, Guus J. M. Velders, Martin K. Vollmer, and Ray H. J. Wang
Geosci. Model Dev., 13, 3571–3605, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-3571-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-3571-2020, 2020
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This study provides the future greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations under the new set of so-called SSP scenarios (the successors of the IPCC SRES and previous representative concentration pathway (RCP) scenarios). The projected CO2 concentrations range from 350 ppm for low-emission scenarios by 2150 to more than 2000 ppm under the high-emission scenarios. We also provide concentrations, latitudinal gradients, and seasonality for most of the other 42 considered GHGs.
Marielle Saunois, Ann R. Stavert, Ben Poulter, Philippe Bousquet, Josep G. Canadell, Robert B. Jackson, Peter A. Raymond, Edward J. Dlugokencky, Sander Houweling, Prabir K. Patra, Philippe Ciais, Vivek K. Arora, David Bastviken, Peter Bergamaschi, Donald R. Blake, Gordon Brailsford, Lori Bruhwiler, Kimberly M. Carlson, Mark Carrol, Simona Castaldi, Naveen Chandra, Cyril Crevoisier, Patrick M. Crill, Kristofer Covey, Charles L. Curry, Giuseppe Etiope, Christian Frankenberg, Nicola Gedney, Michaela I. Hegglin, Lena Höglund-Isaksson, Gustaf Hugelius, Misa Ishizawa, Akihiko Ito, Greet Janssens-Maenhout, Katherine M. Jensen, Fortunat Joos, Thomas Kleinen, Paul B. Krummel, Ray L. Langenfelds, Goulven G. Laruelle, Licheng Liu, Toshinobu Machida, Shamil Maksyutov, Kyle C. McDonald, Joe McNorton, Paul A. Miller, Joe R. Melton, Isamu Morino, Jurek Müller, Fabiola Murguia-Flores, Vaishali Naik, Yosuke Niwa, Sergio Noce, Simon O'Doherty, Robert J. Parker, Changhui Peng, Shushi Peng, Glen P. Peters, Catherine Prigent, Ronald Prinn, Michel Ramonet, Pierre Regnier, William J. Riley, Judith A. Rosentreter, Arjo Segers, Isobel J. Simpson, Hao Shi, Steven J. Smith, L. Paul Steele, Brett F. Thornton, Hanqin Tian, Yasunori Tohjima, Francesco N. Tubiello, Aki Tsuruta, Nicolas Viovy, Apostolos Voulgarakis, Thomas S. Weber, Michiel van Weele, Guido R. van der Werf, Ray F. Weiss, Doug Worthy, Debra Wunch, Yi Yin, Yukio Yoshida, Wenxin Zhang, Zhen Zhang, Yuanhong Zhao, Bo Zheng, Qing Zhu, Qiuan Zhu, and Qianlai Zhuang
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 12, 1561–1623, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-12-1561-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-12-1561-2020, 2020
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Understanding and quantifying the global methane (CH4) budget is important for assessing realistic pathways to mitigate climate change. We have established a consortium of multidisciplinary scientists under the umbrella of the Global Carbon Project to synthesize and stimulate new research aimed at improving and regularly updating the global methane budget. This is the second version of the review dedicated to the decadal methane budget, integrating results of top-down and bottom-up estimates.
Moya L. Macdonald, Jemma L. Wadham, Dickon Young, Chris R. Lunder, Ove Hermansen, Guillaume Lamarche-Gagnon, and Simon O'Doherty
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 7243–7258, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-7243-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-7243-2020, 2020
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Climate change has caused glaciers in the Arctic to shrink, uncovering new soils. We used field measurements to study the exchange of a group of gases involved in ozone destruction, called halocarbons, between these new soils and the atmosphere. We found that mats of cyanobacteria, early colonisers of soils, are linked to a larger-than-expected exchange of halocarbons with the atmosphere. We also found that gases which are commonly thought to be marine in origin were released from these soils.
Longfei Yu, Eliza Harris, Stephan Henne, Sarah Eggleston, Martin Steinbacher, Lukas Emmenegger, Christoph Zellweger, and Joachim Mohn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 6495–6519, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-6495-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-6495-2020, 2020
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We observed the isotopic composition of nitrous oxide in the unpolluted air at Jungfraujoch for 5 years. Our results indicate a clear seasonal pattern in the isotopic composition, corresponding with that in atmospheric nitrous oxide levels. This is most likely due to temporal variations in both emission processes and air mass sources for Jungfraujoch. Our findings are of importance to global nitrous oxide modelling and to better understanding of long-term trends in atmospheric nitrous oxide.
Luke M. Western, Zhe Sha, Matthew Rigby, Anita L. Ganesan, Alistair J. Manning, Kieran M. Stanley, Simon J. O'Doherty, Dickon Young, and Jonathan Rougier
Geosci. Model Dev., 13, 2095–2107, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-2095-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-2095-2020, 2020
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Assessments of greenhouse gas emissions using atmospheric measurements and meteorological models, or
top-downmethods, are important to verify national inventories or produce a stand-alone estimate where no inventory exists. We present a novel top-down method to estimate emissions. This approach uses a fast method called an integrated nested Laplacian approximation to estimate how these emissions are correlated with other emissions in different locations and at different times.
Elise S. Droste, Karina E. Adcock, Matthew J. Ashfold, Charles Chou, Zoë Fleming, Paul J. Fraser, Lauren J. Gooch, Andrew J. Hind, Ray L. Langenfelds, Emma Leedham Elvidge, Norfazrin Mohd Hanif, Simon O'Doherty, David E. Oram, Chang-Feng Ou-Yang, Marios Panagi, Claire E. Reeves, William T. Sturges, and Johannes C. Laube
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 4787–4807, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4787-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4787-2020, 2020
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We update the tropospheric trends and emissions of six perfluorocarbon (PFC) gases, including separate isomers. Trends for these strong greenhouse gases are still increasing, but at slower rates than previously. The lack of natural sinks results in the global accumulation of 833 million metric tonnes of CO2 equivalent for these six PFCs by 2017. Modelling results indicate potential source regions and types in East Asia, but we find that many emissions are unaccounted for in emission reports.
August Andersson, Elena N. Kirillova, Stefano Decesari, Langley DeWitt, Jimmy Gasore, Katherine E. Potter, Ronald G. Prinn, Maheswar Rupakheti, Jean de Dieu Ndikubwimana, Julius Nkusi, and Bonfils Safari
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 4561–4573, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4561-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4561-2020, 2020
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Large-scale biomass burning events seasonally cover sub-Saharan Africa with air particles. In this study, we find that the concentrations of these particles at a remote mountain site in Rwanda may increase by a factor of 10 during such dry biomass burning periods, with strong implications for the regional climate and human health. These results provide quantitative constraints that could contribute to reducing the large uncertainties regarding the environmental impact of these fires.
Gianluca Mussetti, Dominik Brunner, Stephan Henne, Jonas Allegrini, E. Scott Krayenhoff, Sebastian Schubert, Christian Feigenwinter, Roland Vogt, Andreas Wicki, and Jan Carmeliet
Geosci. Model Dev., 13, 1685–1710, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-1685-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-1685-2020, 2020
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Street trees are regarded as a powerful measure to reduce excessive heat in cities. To enable city-wide studies of the cooling effect of street trees, we developed a coupled urban climate model with explicit representation of street trees (COSMO-BEP-Tree). The model compares well with surface, flux and satellite observations and responds realistically to changes in tree characteristics. Street trees largely impact energy fluxes and wind speed, while air temperatures are only slightly reduced.
Anna Karion, William Callahan, Michael Stock, Steve Prinzivalli, Kristal R. Verhulst, Jooil Kim, Peter K. Salameh, Israel Lopez-Coto, and James Whetstone
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 12, 699–717, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-12-699-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-12-699-2020, 2020
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Our paper presents atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and methane in the northeastern United States. We also describe the collection, quality control, and uncertainty estimation methods associated with the observations. The network is composed of 23 tower-based stations, including a dense sub-network in the Washington, DC, and Baltimore, Maryland, urban areas. Observations can be used to assess greenhouse gas emissions from these cities and regions.
Roger J. Francey, Jorgen S. Frederiksen, L. Paul Steele, and Ray L. Langenfelds
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 14741–14754, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14741-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14741-2019, 2019
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25-year composites of interhemispheric baseline CO2 differences demonstrate close agreement between 4 monitoring networks. Variability from monthly to multiyear time frames mostly reflects variability in upper troposphere dynamical indices chosen to represent eddy and mean transport interhemispheric exchange. Monthly interhemispheric atmospheric fluxes are much larger than air–surface terrestrial exchanges. The composite differences offer unusual constraints on transport in global carbon models.
Ignacio Pisso, Espen Sollum, Henrik Grythe, Nina I. Kristiansen, Massimo Cassiani, Sabine Eckhardt, Delia Arnold, Don Morton, Rona L. Thompson, Christine D. Groot Zwaaftink, Nikolaos Evangeliou, Harald Sodemann, Leopold Haimberger, Stephan Henne, Dominik Brunner, John F. Burkhart, Anne Fouilloux, Jerome Brioude, Anne Philipp, Petra Seibert, and Andreas Stohl
Geosci. Model Dev., 12, 4955–4997, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-12-4955-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-12-4955-2019, 2019
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We present the latest release of the Lagrangian transport model FLEXPART, which simulates the transport, diffusion, dry and wet deposition, radioactive decay, and 1st-order chemical reactions of atmospheric tracers. The model has been recently updated both technically and in the representation of physicochemical processes. We describe the changes, document the most recent input and output files, provide working examples, and introduce testing capabilities.
Angelina Wenger, Katherine Pugsley, Simon O'Doherty, Matt Rigby, Alistair J. Manning, Mark F. Lunt, and Emily D. White
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 14057–14070, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14057-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14057-2019, 2019
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We present 14CO2 observations at a background site in Ireland and a tall tower site in the UK. These data have been used to calculate the contribution of fossil fuel sources to atmospheric CO2 mole fractions from the UK and Ireland. 14CO2 emissions from nuclear industry sites in the UK cause a higher uncertainty in the results compared to observations in other locations. The observed ffCO2 at the site was not significantly different from simulated values based on the bottom-up inventory.
Maxime Prignon, Simon Chabrillat, Daniele Minganti, Simon O'Doherty, Christian Servais, Gabriele Stiller, Geoffrey C. Toon, Martin K. Vollmer, and Emmanuel Mahieu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 12309–12324, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-12309-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-12309-2019, 2019
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Hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) are the first, but temporary, substitution products for the strong ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). In this work, we present and validate an improved method to retrieve the most abundant HCFC in the atmosphere, allowing its evolution to be monitored independently in the troposphere and stratosphere. These kinds of contributions are fundamental for scrutinizing the fulfilment of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer.
Erkan Ibraim, Benjamin Wolf, Eliza Harris, Rainer Gasche, Jing Wei, Longfei Yu, Ralf Kiese, Sarah Eggleston, Klaus Butterbach-Bahl, Matthias Zeeman, Béla Tuzson, Lukas Emmenegger, Johan Six, Stephan Henne, and Joachim Mohn
Biogeosciences, 16, 3247–3266, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-16-3247-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-16-3247-2019, 2019
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Nitrous oxide (N2O) is an important greenhouse gas and the major stratospheric ozone-depleting substance; therefore, mitigation of anthropogenic N2O emissions is needed. To trace N2O-emitting source processes, in this study, we observed N2O isotopocules above an intensively managed grassland research site with a recently developed laser spectroscopy method. Our results indicate that the domain of denitrification or nitrifier denitrification was the major N2O source.
Ann R. Stavert, Simon O'Doherty, Kieran Stanley, Dickon Young, Alistair J. Manning, Mark F. Lunt, Christopher Rennick, and Tim Arnold
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 12, 4495–4518, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-4495-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-4495-2019, 2019
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Under the UK GAUGE project, two new greenhouse gas observation sites were established in the 2013/2014 winter at two telecommunications towers. A combination of spectroscopic and chromatographic instrumentation was used to measure CO2, CH4, CO, N2O and SF6. The advantages and disadvantages of two CRDS sample drying strategies, Nafion(R) and empirical water correction, were also examined.
Jens Mühle, Cathy M. Trudinger, Luke M. Western, Matthew Rigby, Martin K. Vollmer, Sunyoung Park, Alistair J. Manning, Daniel Say, Anita Ganesan, L. Paul Steele, Diane J. Ivy, Tim Arnold, Shanlan Li, Andreas Stohl, Christina M. Harth, Peter K. Salameh, Archie McCulloch, Simon O'Doherty, Mi-Kyung Park, Chun Ok Jo, Dickon Young, Kieran M. Stanley, Paul B. Krummel, Blagoj Mitrevski, Ove Hermansen, Chris Lunder, Nikolaos Evangeliou, Bo Yao, Jooil Kim, Benjamin Hmiel, Christo Buizert, Vasilii V. Petrenko, Jgor Arduini, Michela Maione, David M. Etheridge, Eleni Michalopoulou, Mike Czerniak, Jeffrey P. Severinghaus, Stefan Reimann, Peter G. Simmonds, Paul J. Fraser, Ronald G. Prinn, and Ray F. Weiss
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 10335–10359, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-10335-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-10335-2019, 2019
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We discuss atmospheric concentrations and emissions of the strong greenhouse gas perfluorocyclobutane. A large fraction of recent emissions stem from China, India, and Russia, probably as a by-product from the production of fluoropolymers and fluorochemicals. Most historic emissions likely stem from developed countries. Total emissions are higher than what is being reported. Clearly, more measurements and better reporting are needed to understand emissions of this and other greenhouse gases.
Daniel Say, Anita L. Ganesan, Mark F. Lunt, Matthew Rigby, Simon O'Doherty, Christina Harth, Alistair J. Manning, Paul B. Krummel, and Stephane Bauguitte
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 9865–9885, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-9865-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-9865-2019, 2019
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Despite its emergence as a global economic power, very little information exists regarding India's halocarbon (CFC, HCFC, HFC and chlorocarbon) emissions. We report atmospheric measurements of these gases from above India, and use them to estimate India's emissions. Our results are consistent with the emissions profile of a developing country, with large emissions of HCFCs, HFCs and chlorocarbons not regulated under the Montreal Protocol, but little evidence for ongoing CFC consumption.
Stuart N. Riddick, Denise L. Mauzerall, Michael Celia, Neil R. P. Harris, Grant Allen, Joseph Pitt, John Staunton-Sykes, Grant L. Forster, Mary Kang, David Lowry, Euan G. Nisbet, and Alistair J. Manning
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 9787–9796, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-9787-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-9787-2019, 2019
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Currently, bottom-up methods estimate that 0.13 % of methane produced by UK North Sea oil and gas installations is lost. Here we measure emissions from eight platforms in the North Sea and, when considered collectively, the methane loss is estimated at 0.19 % of gas production. As this ambient loss is not explicitly accounted for in the bottom-up approach, these measured emissions represent significant additional emissions above previous estimates.
Joseph R. Pitt, Grant Allen, Stéphane J.-B. Bauguitte, Martin W. Gallagher, James D. Lee, Will Drysdale, Beth Nelson, Alistair J. Manning, and Paul I. Palmer
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 8931–8945, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-8931-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-8931-2019, 2019
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This paper presents a new method to assess inventory estimates of greenhouse gas and air pollutant emissions for large cities and their surrounding regions. A case study using data sampled by a research aircraft around London was used to test the method. We found that the UK national inventory agrees with our observations for CO but needed lower emissions for CH4 to agree with the measured data. Repeated studies could help determine how these emissions vary on different timescales.
David D. Parrish, Richard G. Derwent, Simon O'Doherty, and Peter G. Simmonds
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 12, 3383–3394, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3383-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3383-2019, 2019
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We present a flexible method that employs a power series expansion and Fourier series analysis to characterize the average long-term change and seasonal cycle, respectively, from a time series of observations of a trace atmospheric species. This approach maximizes the statistically significant information derived, including non-linear aspects of the long-term trends, without over fitting the data. Generally, a small set of parameter values (e.g., 7 or 8) provides this characterization.
Ruhi S. Humphries, Ian M. McRobert, Will A. Ponsonby, Jason P. Ward, Melita D. Keywood, Zoe M. Loh, Paul B. Krummel, and James Harnwell
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 12, 3019–3038, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3019-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3019-2019, 2019
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Undertaking atmospheric observations from ships provides important data in regions where measurements are impossible by other means. However, making measurements so close to a diesel exhaust plume is difficult. In this paper, we describe an algorithm that utilises ongoing measurements of aerosol number concentrations, black carbon mass concentrations, and mixing ratios of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide to accurately distinguish between exhaust and background data periods.
Mauro Rubino, David M. Etheridge, David P. Thornton, Russell Howden, Colin E. Allison, Roger J. Francey, Ray L. Langenfelds, L. Paul Steele, Cathy M. Trudinger, Darren A. Spencer, Mark A. J. Curran, Tas D. van Ommen, and Andrew M. Smith
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 11, 473–492, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-11-473-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-11-473-2019, 2019
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The scientific community uses numerical models to predict future atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases causing global warming. This study presents the history of atmospheric concentration of the major greenhouse gases over the last 2000 years measured in ice core bubbles from the site of Law Dome (East Antarctica). The associated dataset is useful to test climate models and help provide accurate predictions of future climate change.
Lucien Froidevaux, Douglas E. Kinnison, Ray Wang, John Anderson, and Ryan A. Fuller
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 4783–4821, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-4783-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-4783-2019, 2019
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This work evaluates two versions of a 3-D global model of upper-atmospheric composition for recent decades. The two versions differ mainly in their dynamical (wind) constraints. Model–data differences, variability, and trends in five gases (ozone, H2O, HCl, HNO3, and N2O) are compared. While the match between models and observations is impressive, a few areas of discrepancy are noted. This work also updates trends in composition based on recent satellite-based measurements (through 2018).
Emily D. White, Matthew Rigby, Mark F. Lunt, T. Luke Smallman, Edward Comyn-Platt, Alistair J. Manning, Anita L. Ganesan, Simon O'Doherty, Ann R. Stavert, Kieran Stanley, Mathew Williams, Peter Levy, Michel Ramonet, Grant L. Forster, Andrew C. Manning, and Paul I. Palmer
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 4345–4365, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-4345-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-4345-2019, 2019
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Understanding carbon dioxide (CO2) fluxes from the terrestrial biosphere on a national scale is important for evaluating land use strategies to mitigate climate change. We estimate emissions of CO2 from the UK biosphere using atmospheric data in a top-down approach. Our findings show that bottom-up estimates from models of biospheric fluxes overestimate the amount of CO2 uptake in summer. This suggests these models wrongly estimate or omit key processes, e.g. land disturbance due to harvest.
Martin K. Vollmer, François Bernard, Blagoj Mitrevski, L. Paul Steele, Cathy M. Trudinger, Stefan Reimann, Ray L. Langenfelds, Paul B. Krummel, Paul J. Fraser, David M. Etheridge, Mark A. J. Curran, and James B. Burkholder
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 3481–3492, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-3481-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-3481-2019, 2019
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We have discovered a new compound in the atmosphere, octafluorooxolane (c-C4F8O), from measurements in archived air samples. From our laboratory studies, we find that c-C4F8O is a very powerful greenhouse gas thereby contributing to global warming, and that it has a very long atmospheric lifetime of more than 3500 years. Based on our measurements we could reconstruct its atmospheric evolution over more than 4 decades. Based on this, we could estimate the global emissions of c-C4F8O.
Kieran Brophy, Heather Graven, Alistair J. Manning, Emily White, Tim Arnold, Marc L. Fischer, Seongeun Jeong, Xinguang Cui, and Matthew Rigby
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 2991–3006, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-2991-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-2991-2019, 2019
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We investigate potential errors and uncertainties related to the spatial and temporal prior representation of emissions and modelled atmospheric transport for the inversion of California's fossil fuel CO2 emissions. Our results indicate that uncertainties in posterior total state fossil fuel CO2 estimates arising from the choice of prior emissions or atmospheric transport model are on the order of 15 % or less for the ground-based network in California we consider.
Daniel Say, Anita L. Ganesan, Mark F. Lunt, Matthew Rigby, Simon O'Doherty, Chris Harth, Alistair J. Manning, Paul B. Krummel, and Stephane Bauguitte
Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2018-1287, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2018-1287, 2019
Publication in ACP not foreseen
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India is a potentially significant source of chlorocarbons, gases typically used as solvents and feedstocks. Given the potential for these species to deplete stratospheric ozone, understanding their sources is important. We use flask measurements collected from an aircraft to infer India's chlorocarbon emissions. We link emissions of carbon tetrachloride to the industrial production of other chloromethanes, and provide evidence for rapid growth in India's emissions of dichloromethane.
Ann R. Stavert, Rachel M. Law, Marcel van der Schoot, Ray L. Langenfelds, Darren A. Spencer, Paul B. Krummel, Scott D. Chambers, Alistair G. Williams, Sylvester Werczynski, Roger J. Francey, and Russell T. Howden
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 12, 1103–1121, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-1103-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-1103-2019, 2019
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The Southern Ocean is a key sink of carbon dioxide (CO2), but efforts to study trends in and the variability of the sink have been hindered by the limited number of CO2 measurements in this region. Here we describe a set of new in situ continuous (minutely) atmospheric CO2 observations. We show that this new record better captures long-term changes and seasonality than traditional 2-weekly flask records. As such, this data set will provide key insights into the changing Southern Ocean sink.
H. Langley DeWitt, Jimmy Gasore, Maheswar Rupakheti, Katherine E. Potter, Ronald G. Prinn, Jean de Dieu Ndikubwimana, Julius Nkusi, and Bonfils Safari
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 2063–2078, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-2063-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-2063-2019, 2019
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Air quality in rapidly developing East Africa is a growing but understudied concern. We analyzed long-term black carbon, carbon monoxide, and ozone measurements from the remote Rwanda Climate Observatory and found that seasonal regional biomass burning raised black carbon levels to above-urban concentrations 6 months out of the year. Additional local pollution could exacerbate this issue. More regional monitoring needs to be done to understand and reduce air pollution in this region.
Pingyang Li, Jens Mühle, Stephen A. Montzka, David E. Oram, Benjamin R. Miller, Ray F. Weiss, Paul J. Fraser, and Toste Tanhua
Ocean Sci., 15, 33–60, https://doi.org/10.5194/os-15-33-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/os-15-33-2019, 2019
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Use of CFCs as oceanic transient tracers is difficult for recently ventilated water masses as their atmospheric mole fractions have been decreasing. To explore novel tracers, we synthesized consistent annual mean atmospheric histories of HCFC-22, HCFC-141b, HCFC-142b, HFC-134a, HFC-125, HFC-23, PFC-14 (CF4) and PFC-116 in both hemispheres and reconstructed their solubility functions in water and seawater. This work is also potentially useful for tracer studies in a range of natural waters.
Sarah Connors, Alistair J. Manning, Andrew D. Robinson, Stuart N. Riddick, Grant L. Forster, Anita Ganesan, Aoife Grant, Stephen Humphrey, Simon O'Doherty, Dave E. Oram, Paul I. Palmer, Robert L. Skelton, Kieran Stanley, Ann Stavert, Dickon Young, and Neil R. P. Harris
Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2018-1187, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2018-1187, 2018
Preprint withdrawn
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Methane is an important greenhouse gas & reducing its emissions is a vital part of climate change mitigation to limit global temperature increase to 1.5 °C or 2.0 °C. This paper explains a way to estimate emitted methane over a sub-national area by combining measurements & computer dispersion modelling in a so-called
inversiontechnique. Compared with the current national inventory, our results show lower emissions for Cambridgeshire, possibly due to waste sector emission differences.
Christine D. Groot Zwaaftink, Stephan Henne, Rona L. Thompson, Edward J. Dlugokencky, Toshinobu Machida, Jean-Daniel Paris, Motoki Sasakawa, Arjo Segers, Colm Sweeney, and Andreas Stohl
Geosci. Model Dev., 11, 4469–4487, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-11-4469-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-11-4469-2018, 2018
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A Lagrangian particle dispersion model is used to simulate global fields of methane, constrained by observations through nudging. We show that this rather simple and computationally inexpensive method can give results similar to or as good as a computationally expensive Eulerian chemistry transport model with a data assimilation scheme. The three-dimensional methane fields are of interest to applications such as inverse modelling and satellite retrievals.
Benjamin Brown-Steiner, Noelle E. Selin, Ronald Prinn, Simone Tilmes, Louisa Emmons, Jean-François Lamarque, and Philip Cameron-Smith
Geosci. Model Dev., 11, 4155–4174, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-11-4155-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-11-4155-2018, 2018
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We conduct three simulations of atmospheric chemistry using chemical mechanisms of different levels of complexity and compare their results to observations. We explore situations in which the simplified mechanisms match the output of the most complex mechanism, as well as when they diverge. We investigate how concurrent utilization of chemical mechanisms of different complexities can further our atmospheric-chemistry understanding at various scales and give some strategies for future research.
Tim Arnold, Alistair J. Manning, Jooil Kim, Shanlan Li, Helen Webster, David Thomson, Jens Mühle, Ray F. Weiss, Sunyoung Park, and Simon O'Doherty
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 13305–13320, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-13305-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-13305-2018, 2018
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Emissions of carbon tetrafluoride CF4, NF3 and CHF3 in east Asia have been calculated using atmospheric measurements and an atmospheric transport model. We calculate emissions of CF4 to be quite constant between the years 2008 and 2015 for both China and South Korea, with 2015 emissions calculated at 4.33 ± 2.65 Gg yr-1 and 0.36 ± 0.11 Gg yr-1, respectively. Emission estimates of NF3 from South Korea could be made with relatively small uncertainty at 0.6 ± 0.07 Gg yr-1 in 2015.
Paul I. Palmer, Simon O'Doherty, Grant Allen, Keith Bower, Hartmut Bösch, Martyn P. Chipperfield, Sarah Connors, Sandip Dhomse, Liang Feng, Douglas P. Finch, Martin W. Gallagher, Emanuel Gloor, Siegfried Gonzi, Neil R. P. Harris, Carole Helfter, Neil Humpage, Brian Kerridge, Diane Knappett, Roderic L. Jones, Michael Le Breton, Mark F. Lunt, Alistair J. Manning, Stephan Matthiesen, Jennifer B. A. Muller, Neil Mullinger, Eiko Nemitz, Sebastian O'Shea, Robert J. Parker, Carl J. Percival, Joseph Pitt, Stuart N. Riddick, Matthew Rigby, Harjinder Sembhi, Richard Siddans, Robert L. Skelton, Paul Smith, Hannah Sonderfeld, Kieran Stanley, Ann R. Stavert, Angelina Wenger, Emily White, Christopher Wilson, and Dickon Young
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 11753–11777, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-11753-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-11753-2018, 2018
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This paper provides an overview of the Greenhouse gAs Uk and Global Emissions (GAUGE) experiment. GAUGE was designed to quantify nationwide GHG emissions of the UK, bringing together measurements and atmospheric transport models. This novel experiment is the first of its kind. We anticipate it will inform the blueprint for countries that are building a measurement infrastructure in preparation for global stocktakes, which are a key part of the Paris Agreement.
Sunyoung Park, Shanlan Li, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Ray F. Weiss, Xuekun Fang, Stefan Reimann, and Ronald G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 11729–11738, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-11729-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-11729-2018, 2018
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Multi-year, real-time atmospheric carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) record obtained at Gosan station (33° N, 126° E) presents evidence of significant unreported emissions of this first-generation ozone-depleting substance. The missing emissions (~ 19 Gg yr−1) for China contribute to approximately 54 % of global emissions and are most likely related to CCl4 escape occurring during the production of chlorinated compounds and their usage as feedstocks and process agents in chemical manufacturing industries.
Benjamin Brown-Steiner, Noelle E. Selin, Ronald G. Prinn, Erwan Monier, Simone Tilmes, Louisa Emmons, and Fernando Garcia-Menendez
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 8373–8388, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-8373-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-8373-2018, 2018
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Detecting signals in observations and simulations of atmospheric chemistry is difficult due to the underlying variability in the chemistry, meteorology, and climatology. Here we examine the scale dependence of ozone variability and explore strategies for reducing or averaging this variability and thereby enhancing ozone signal detection capabilities. We find that 10–15 years of temporal averaging, and some level of spatial averaging, reduces the risk of overconfidence in ozone signals.
Myriam Guillevic, Martin K. Vollmer, Simon A. Wyss, Daiana Leuenberger, Andreas Ackermann, Céline Pascale, Bernhard Niederhauser, and Stefan Reimann
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 11, 3351–3372, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-3351-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-3351-2018, 2018
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We present new primary calibration scales for five halogenated greenhouse gases. The preparation method, newly applied to halocarbons, is dynamic and gravimetric
and allows the generation of reference gas mixtures at near-ambient levels (pmol mol−1). Each prepared molar fraction is traceable to the
realisation of SI units (International System of Units) and is assigned an uncertainty estimate following international guidelines.
Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, Jgor Arduini, Tim Arnold, H. Langley DeWitt, Paul J. Fraser, Anita L. Ganesan, Jimmy Gasore, Christina M. Harth, Ove Hermansen, Jooil Kim, Paul B. Krummel, Shanlan Li, Zoë M. Loh, Chris R. Lunder, Michela Maione, Alistair J. Manning, Ben R. Miller, Blagoj Mitrevski, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Sunyoung Park, Stefan Reimann, Matt Rigby, Takuya Saito, Peter K. Salameh, Roland Schmidt, Peter G. Simmonds, L. Paul Steele, Martin K. Vollmer, Ray H. Wang, Bo Yao, Yoko Yokouchi, Dickon Young, and Lingxi Zhou
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 10, 985–1018, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-985-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-985-2018, 2018
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We present the data and accomplishments of the multinational global atmospheric measurement program AGAGE (Advanced Global Atmospheric Gases Experiment). At high frequency and at multiple sites, AGAGE measures all the important chemicals in the Montreal Protocol for the protection of the ozone layer and the non-carbon-dioxide gases assessed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. AGAGE uses these data to estimate sources and sinks of all these gases and has operated since 1978.
Karina E. Adcock, Claire E. Reeves, Lauren J. Gooch, Emma C. Leedham Elvidge, Matthew J. Ashfold, Carl A. M. Brenninkmeijer, Charles Chou, Paul J. Fraser, Ray L. Langenfelds, Norfazrin Mohd Hanif, Simon O'Doherty, David E. Oram, Chang-Feng Ou-Yang, Siew Moi Phang, Azizan Abu Samah, Thomas Röckmann, William T. Sturges, and Johannes C. Laube
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 4737–4751, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4737-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4737-2018, 2018
Peter G. Simmonds, Matthew Rigby, Archie McCulloch, Martin K. Vollmer, Stephan Henne, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Alistair J. Manning, Paul B. Krummel, Paul J. Fraser, Dickon Young, Ray F. Weiss, Peter K. Salameh, Christina M. Harth, Stefan Reimann, Cathy M. Trudinger, L. Paul Steele, Ray H. J. Wang, Diane J. Ivy, Ronald G. Prinn, Blagoj Mitrevski, and David M. Etheridge
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 4153–4169, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4153-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4153-2018, 2018
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Recent measurements of the potent greenhouse gas HFC-23, a by-product of HCFC-22 production, show a 28 % increase in the atmospheric mole fraction from 2009 to 2016. A minimum in the atmospheric abundance of HFC-23 in 2009 was attributed to abatement of HFC-23 emissions by incineration under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). Our results indicate that the recent increase in HFC-23 emissions is driven by failure of mitigation under the CDM to keep pace with increased HCFC-22 production.
Fabian Schoenenberger, Stephan Henne, Matthias Hill, Martin K. Vollmer, Giorgos Kouvarakis, Nikolaos Mihalopoulos, Simon O'Doherty, Michela Maione, Lukas Emmenegger, Thomas Peter, and Stefan Reimann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 4069–4092, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4069-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4069-2018, 2018
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Anthropogenic halocarbon emissions contribute to stratospheric ozone depletion and global warming. We measured atmospheric halocarbons for 6 months on Crete to extend the coverage of the existing observation network to the Eastern Mediterranean. The derived emission estimates showed a contribution of 16.8 % (13.6–23.3 %) and 53.2 % (38.1–84.2 %) of this region to the total HFC and HCFC emissions of the analyzed European domain and a reduction of the underlying uncertainties by 40–80 %.
Kieran M. Stanley, Aoife Grant, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Alistair J. Manning, Ann R. Stavert, T. Gerard Spain, Peter K. Salameh, Christina M. Harth, Peter G. Simmonds, William T. Sturges, David E. Oram, and Richard G. Derwent
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 11, 1437–1458, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-1437-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-1437-2018, 2018
Emma Leedham Elvidge, Harald Bönisch, Carl A. M. Brenninkmeijer, Andreas Engel, Paul J. Fraser, Eileen Gallacher, Ray Langenfelds, Jens Mühle, David E. Oram, Eric A. Ray, Anna R. Ridley, Thomas Röckmann, William T. Sturges, Ray F. Weiss, and Johannes C. Laube
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 3369–3385, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-3369-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-3369-2018, 2018
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Chemical species measured in stratospheric air can be used as proxies for stratospheric circulation changes which cannot be measured directly. A range of tracers is important to understand changing stratospheric dynamics. We demonstrate the suitability of PFCs and HFCs as tracers and support recent work that reduces the current stratospheric lifetime of SF6. Updates to policy-relevant parameters (e.g. stratospheric lifetime) linked to this change are provided for O3-depleting substances.
William T. Ball, Justin Alsing, Daniel J. Mortlock, Johannes Staehelin, Joanna D. Haigh, Thomas Peter, Fiona Tummon, Rene Stübi, Andrea Stenke, John Anderson, Adam Bourassa, Sean M. Davis, Doug Degenstein, Stacey Frith, Lucien Froidevaux, Chris Roth, Viktoria Sofieva, Ray Wang, Jeannette Wild, Pengfei Yu, Jerald R. Ziemke, and Eugene V. Rozanov
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 1379–1394, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1379-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1379-2018, 2018
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Using a robust analysis, with artefact-corrected ozone data, we confirm upper stratospheric ozone is recovering following the Montreal Protocol, but that lower stratospheric ozone (50° S–50° N) has continued to decrease since 1998, and the ozone layer as a whole (60° S–60° N) may be lower today than in 1998. No change in total column ozone may be due to increasing tropospheric ozone. State-of-the-art models do not reproduce lower stratospheric ozone decreases.
Peter Bergamaschi, Ute Karstens, Alistair J. Manning, Marielle Saunois, Aki Tsuruta, Antoine Berchet, Alexander T. Vermeulen, Tim Arnold, Greet Janssens-Maenhout, Samuel Hammer, Ingeborg Levin, Martina Schmidt, Michel Ramonet, Morgan Lopez, Jost Lavric, Tuula Aalto, Huilin Chen, Dietrich G. Feist, Christoph Gerbig, László Haszpra, Ove Hermansen, Giovanni Manca, John Moncrieff, Frank Meinhardt, Jaroslaw Necki, Michal Galkowski, Simon O'Doherty, Nina Paramonova, Hubertus A. Scheeren, Martin Steinbacher, and Ed Dlugokencky
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 901–920, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-901-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-901-2018, 2018
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European methane (CH4) emissions are estimated for 2006–2012 using atmospheric in situ measurements from 18 European monitoring stations and 7 different inverse models. Our analysis highlights the potential significant contribution of natural emissions from wetlands (including peatlands and wet soils) to the total European emissions. The top-down estimates of total EU-28 CH4 emissions are broadly consistent with the sum of reported anthropogenic CH4 emissions and the estimated natural emissions.
Martin K. Vollmer, Dickon Young, Cathy M. Trudinger, Jens Mühle, Stephan Henne, Matthew Rigby, Sunyoung Park, Shanlan Li, Myriam Guillevic, Blagoj Mitrevski, Christina M. Harth, Benjamin R. Miller, Stefan Reimann, Bo Yao, L. Paul Steele, Simon A. Wyss, Chris R. Lunder, Jgor Arduini, Archie McCulloch, Songhao Wu, Tae Siek Rhee, Ray H. J. Wang, Peter K. Salameh, Ove Hermansen, Matthias Hill, Ray L. Langenfelds, Diane Ivy, Simon O'Doherty, Paul B. Krummel, Michela Maione, David M. Etheridge, Lingxi Zhou, Paul J. Fraser, Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, and Peter G. Simmonds
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 979–1002, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-979-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-979-2018, 2018
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We measured the three chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) CFC-13, CFC-114, and CFC-115 in the atmosphere because they are important in stratospheric ozone depletion. These compounds should have decreased in the atmosphere because they are banned by the Montreal Protocol but we find the opposite. Emissions over the last decade have not declined on a global scale. We use inverse modeling and our observations to find that a large part of the emissions originate in the Asian region.
Kelley C. Wells, Dylan B. Millet, Nicolas Bousserez, Daven K. Henze, Timothy J. Griffis, Sreelekha Chaliyakunnel, Edward J. Dlugokencky, Eri Saikawa, Gao Xiang, Ronald G. Prinn, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Ray F. Weiss, Geoff S. Dutton, James W. Elkins, Paul B. Krummel, Ray Langenfelds, and L. Paul Steele
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 735–756, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-735-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-735-2018, 2018
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This paper uses three different frameworks to derive nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions based on global surface observations. One of these frameworks employs a new approach that allows for fast computation and explores a larger solution space than other methods. Our results point to a few conclusions about the global N2O budget, including a larger contribution from tropical sources, an overestimate of natural soil emissions, and an underestimate of agricultural sources particularly in springtime.
Marielle Saunois, Philippe Bousquet, Ben Poulter, Anna Peregon, Philippe Ciais, Josep G. Canadell, Edward J. Dlugokencky, Giuseppe Etiope, David Bastviken, Sander Houweling, Greet Janssens-Maenhout, Francesco N. Tubiello, Simona Castaldi, Robert B. Jackson, Mihai Alexe, Vivek K. Arora, David J. Beerling, Peter Bergamaschi, Donald R. Blake, Gordon Brailsford, Lori Bruhwiler, Cyril Crevoisier, Patrick Crill, Kristofer Covey, Christian Frankenberg, Nicola Gedney, Lena Höglund-Isaksson, Misa Ishizawa, Akihiko Ito, Fortunat Joos, Heon-Sook Kim, Thomas Kleinen, Paul Krummel, Jean-François Lamarque, Ray Langenfelds, Robin Locatelli, Toshinobu Machida, Shamil Maksyutov, Joe R. Melton, Isamu Morino, Vaishali Naik, Simon O'Doherty, Frans-Jan W. Parmentier, Prabir K. Patra, Changhui Peng, Shushi Peng, Glen P. Peters, Isabelle Pison, Ronald Prinn, Michel Ramonet, William J. Riley, Makoto Saito, Monia Santini, Ronny Schroeder, Isobel J. Simpson, Renato Spahni, Atsushi Takizawa, Brett F. Thornton, Hanqin Tian, Yasunori Tohjima, Nicolas Viovy, Apostolos Voulgarakis, Ray Weiss, David J. Wilton, Andy Wiltshire, Doug Worthy, Debra Wunch, Xiyan Xu, Yukio Yoshida, Bowen Zhang, Zhen Zhang, and Qiuan Zhu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 11135–11161, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-11135-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-11135-2017, 2017
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Following the Global Methane Budget 2000–2012 published in Saunois et al. (2016), we use the same dataset of bottom-up and top-down approaches to discuss the variations in methane emissions over the period 2000–2012. The changes in emissions are discussed both in terms of trends and quasi-decadal changes. The ensemble gathered here allows us to synthesise the robust changes in terms of regional and sectorial contributions to the increasing methane emissions.
Dominik Brunner, Tim Arnold, Stephan Henne, Alistair Manning, Rona L. Thompson, Michela Maione, Simon O'Doherty, and Stefan Reimann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 10651–10674, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10651-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10651-2017, 2017
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Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and SF6 are industrially produced gases with a large greenhouse-gas warming potential. In this study, we estimated the emissions of HFCs and SF6 over Europe by combining measurements at three background stations with four different model systems. We identified significant differences between our estimates and nationally reported numbers, but also found that the network of only three sites in Europe is insufficient to reliably attribute emissions to individual countries.
Wolfgang Steinbrecht, Lucien Froidevaux, Ryan Fuller, Ray Wang, John Anderson, Chris Roth, Adam Bourassa, Doug Degenstein, Robert Damadeo, Joe Zawodny, Stacey Frith, Richard McPeters, Pawan Bhartia, Jeannette Wild, Craig Long, Sean Davis, Karen Rosenlof, Viktoria Sofieva, Kaley Walker, Nabiz Rahpoe, Alexei Rozanov, Mark Weber, Alexandra Laeng, Thomas von Clarmann, Gabriele Stiller, Natalya Kramarova, Sophie Godin-Beekmann, Thierry Leblanc, Richard Querel, Daan Swart, Ian Boyd, Klemens Hocke, Niklaus Kämpfer, Eliane Maillard Barras, Lorena Moreira, Gerald Nedoluha, Corinne Vigouroux, Thomas Blumenstock, Matthias Schneider, Omaira García, Nicholas Jones, Emmanuel Mahieu, Dan Smale, Michael Kotkamp, John Robinson, Irina Petropavlovskikh, Neil Harris, Birgit Hassler, Daan Hubert, and Fiona Tummon
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 10675–10690, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10675-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10675-2017, 2017
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Thanks to the 1987 Montreal Protocol and its amendments, ozone-depleting chlorine (and bromine) in the stratosphere has declined slowly since the late 1990s. Improved and extended long-term ozone profile observations from satellites and ground-based stations confirm that ozone is responding as expected and has increased by about 2 % per decade since 2000 in the upper stratosphere, around 40 km altitude. At lower altitudes, however, ozone has not changed significantly since 2000.
Yann Poltera, Giovanni Martucci, Martine Collaud Coen, Maxime Hervo, Lukas Emmenegger, Stephan Henne, Dominik Brunner, and Alexander Haefele
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 10051–10070, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10051-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-10051-2017, 2017
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We present the PathfinderTURB algorithm for the analysis of ceilometer backscatter data and the real-time detection of the vertical structure of the planetary boundary layer. PathfinderTURB has been applied to 1 year of data measured by two ceilometers operated at two Swiss stations: the Aerological Observatory of Payerne on the Swiss plateau, and the Alpine Jungfraujoch observatory. The study shows that aerosols from the boundary layer significantly influence the air measured at Jungfraujoch.
Kristal R. Verhulst, Anna Karion, Jooil Kim, Peter K. Salameh, Ralph F. Keeling, Sally Newman, John Miller, Christopher Sloop, Thomas Pongetti, Preeti Rao, Clare Wong, Francesca M. Hopkins, Vineet Yadav, Ray F. Weiss, Riley M. Duren, and Charles E. Miller
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 8313–8341, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-8313-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-8313-2017, 2017
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We present the first carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) measurements from an extensive surface network as part of the Los Angeles Megacity Carbon Project. We describe methods that are essential for understanding carbon fluxes from complex urban environments. CO2 and CH4 levels are spatially and temporally variable, with urban sites showing significant enhancements relative to background. In 2015, the median afternoon enhancement near downtown Los Angeles was ~15 ppm CO2 and ~80 ppb CH4.
Stuart N. Riddick, Sarah Connors, Andrew D. Robinson, Alistair J. Manning, Pippa S. D. Jones, David Lowry, Euan Nisbet, Robert L. Skelton, Grant Allen, Joseph Pitt, and Neil R. P. Harris
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 7839–7851, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-7839-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-7839-2017, 2017
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High methane mixing ratios occurred at our long-term measurement site. Isotopic measurements show the source is a landfill 7 km away; the emissions were estimated using three different approaches. The emission estimates made by near-source and middle-distance methods agree well for a period of intense observation. The estimate of the inverse modelling is similar to the labour-intensive middle-distance approach, which shows it can be used to identify point sources within an emission landscape.
Malte Meinshausen, Elisabeth Vogel, Alexander Nauels, Katja Lorbacher, Nicolai Meinshausen, David M. Etheridge, Paul J. Fraser, Stephen A. Montzka, Peter J. Rayner, Cathy M. Trudinger, Paul B. Krummel, Urs Beyerle, Josep G. Canadell, John S. Daniel, Ian G. Enting, Rachel M. Law, Chris R. Lunder, Simon O'Doherty, Ron G. Prinn, Stefan Reimann, Mauro Rubino, Guus J. M. Velders, Martin K. Vollmer, Ray H. J. Wang, and Ray Weiss
Geosci. Model Dev., 10, 2057–2116, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-10-2057-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-10-2057-2017, 2017
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Climate change is primarily driven by human-induced increases of greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations. Based on ongoing community efforts (e.g. AGAGE and NOAA networks, ice cores), this study presents historical concentrations of CO2, CH4, N2O and 40 other GHGs from year 0 to year 2014. The data is recommended as input for climate models for pre-industrial, historical runs under CMIP6. Global means, but also latitudinal by monthly surface concentration fields are provided.
Peter G. Simmonds, Matthew Rigby, Archie McCulloch, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Jens Mühle, Paul B. Krummel, Paul Steele, Paul J. Fraser, Alistair J. Manning, Ray F. Weiss, Peter K. Salameh, Chris M. Harth, Ray H. J. Wang, and Ronald G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 4641–4655, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-4641-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-4641-2017, 2017
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This paper reports how long-term atmospheric measurements demonstrate that the Montreal Protocol has been effective in controlling production and consumption of the hydrochlorofluorocarbons, a group of industrial chemicals that have detrimental effects on the ozone layer and also contribute to global warming as greenhouse gases and their hydrofluorocarbon substitutes which are also potent greenhouse gases but do not materially affect the ozone layer.
Carla Frege, Federico Bianchi, Ugo Molteni, Jasmin Tröstl, Heikki Junninen, Stephan Henne, Mikko Sipilä, Erik Herrmann, Michel J. Rossi, Markku Kulmala, Christopher R. Hoyle, Urs Baltensperger, and Josef Dommen
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 2613–2629, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-2613-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-2613-2017, 2017
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We present measurements of the chemical composition of atmospheric ions at high altitude (3450 m a.s.l.) during a 9-month campaign. We detected remarkably high correlation between methanesulfonic acid (MSA) and SO5−. Halogenated species were also detected frequently at this continental location. New-particle formation events occurred via the condensation of highly oxygenated molecules (HOMs) at very low sulfuric acid concentration or, less frequently, due to ammonia–sulfuric acid clusters.
Whitney Bader, Benoît Bovy, Stephanie Conway, Kimberly Strong, Dan Smale, Alexander J. Turner, Thomas Blumenstock, Chris Boone, Martine Collaud Coen, Ancelin Coulon, Omaira Garcia, David W. T. Griffith, Frank Hase, Petra Hausmann, Nicholas Jones, Paul Krummel, Isao Murata, Isamu Morino, Hideaki Nakajima, Simon O'Doherty, Clare Paton-Walsh, John Robinson, Rodrigue Sandrin, Matthias Schneider, Christian Servais, Ralf Sussmann, and Emmanuel Mahieu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 2255–2277, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-2255-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-2255-2017, 2017
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An increase of 0.31 ± 0.03 % year−1 of atmospheric methane is reported using 10 years of solar observations performed at 10 ground-based stations since 2005. These trend agree with a GEOS-Chem-tagged simulation that accounts for the contribution of each emission source and one sink in the total methane. The GEOS-Chem simulation shows that anthropogenic emissions from coal mining and gas and oil transport and exploration have played a major role in the increase methane since 2005.
Martyn P. Chipperfield, Qing Liang, Matthew Rigby, Ryan Hossaini, Stephen A. Montzka, Sandip Dhomse, Wuhu Feng, Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, Christina M. Harth, Peter K. Salameh, Jens Mühle, Simon O'Doherty, Dickon Young, Peter G. Simmonds, Paul B. Krummel, Paul J. Fraser, L. Paul Steele, James D. Happell, Robert C. Rhew, James Butler, Shari A. Yvon-Lewis, Bradley Hall, David Nance, Fred Moore, Ben R. Miller, James W. Elkins, Jeremy J. Harrison, Chris D. Boone, Elliot L. Atlas, and Emmanuel Mahieu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 15741–15754, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-15741-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-15741-2016, 2016
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Carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) is a compound which, when released into the atmosphere, can cause depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer. Its emissions are controlled under the Montreal Protocol, and its atmospheric abundance is slowly decreasing. However, this decrease is not as fast as expected based on estimates of its emissions and its atmospheric lifetime. We have used an atmospheric model to look at the uncertainties in the CCl4 lifetime and to examine the impact on its atmospheric decay.
Marielle Saunois, Philippe Bousquet, Ben Poulter, Anna Peregon, Philippe Ciais, Josep G. Canadell, Edward J. Dlugokencky, Giuseppe Etiope, David Bastviken, Sander Houweling, Greet Janssens-Maenhout, Francesco N. Tubiello, Simona Castaldi, Robert B. Jackson, Mihai Alexe, Vivek K. Arora, David J. Beerling, Peter Bergamaschi, Donald R. Blake, Gordon Brailsford, Victor Brovkin, Lori Bruhwiler, Cyril Crevoisier, Patrick Crill, Kristofer Covey, Charles Curry, Christian Frankenberg, Nicola Gedney, Lena Höglund-Isaksson, Misa Ishizawa, Akihiko Ito, Fortunat Joos, Heon-Sook Kim, Thomas Kleinen, Paul Krummel, Jean-François Lamarque, Ray Langenfelds, Robin Locatelli, Toshinobu Machida, Shamil Maksyutov, Kyle C. McDonald, Julia Marshall, Joe R. Melton, Isamu Morino, Vaishali Naik, Simon O'Doherty, Frans-Jan W. Parmentier, Prabir K. Patra, Changhui Peng, Shushi Peng, Glen P. Peters, Isabelle Pison, Catherine Prigent, Ronald Prinn, Michel Ramonet, William J. Riley, Makoto Saito, Monia Santini, Ronny Schroeder, Isobel J. Simpson, Renato Spahni, Paul Steele, Atsushi Takizawa, Brett F. Thornton, Hanqin Tian, Yasunori Tohjima, Nicolas Viovy, Apostolos Voulgarakis, Michiel van Weele, Guido R. van der Werf, Ray Weiss, Christine Wiedinmyer, David J. Wilton, Andy Wiltshire, Doug Worthy, Debra Wunch, Xiyan Xu, Yukio Yoshida, Bowen Zhang, Zhen Zhang, and Qiuan Zhu
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 8, 697–751, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-8-697-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-8-697-2016, 2016
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An accurate assessment of the methane budget is important to understand the atmospheric methane concentrations and trends and to provide realistic pathways for climate change mitigation. The various and diffuse sources of methane as well and its oxidation by a very short lifetime radical challenge this assessment. We quantify the methane sources and sinks as well as their uncertainties based on both bottom-up and top-down approaches provided by a broad international scientific community.
Johannes C. Laube, Norfazrin Mohd Hanif, Patricia Martinerie, Eileen Gallacher, Paul J. Fraser, Ray Langenfelds, Carl A. M. Brenninkmeijer, Jakob Schwander, Emmanuel Witrant, Jia-Lin Wang, Chang-Feng Ou-Yang, Lauren J. Gooch, Claire E. Reeves, William T. Sturges, and David E. Oram
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 15347–15358, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-15347-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-15347-2016, 2016
Francesco Graziosi, Jgor Arduini, Paolo Bonasoni, Francesco Furlani, Umberto Giostra, Alistair J. Manning, Archie McCulloch, Simon O'Doherty, Peter G. Simmonds, Stefan Reimann, Martin K. Vollmer, and Michela Maione
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 12849–12859, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-12849-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-12849-2016, 2016
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Carbon tetrachloride is an ozone-depleting greenhouse gas banned under the Montreal Protocol. Measurements of atmospheric levels combined with global transport models indicate that it is still being emitted, in contrast to what is reported. In order to help solve the "mystery of carbon tetrachloride", we estimated European emissions during 2006–2014 using atmospheric observations and models. We identified emission hot spots and showed inconsistencies in national emission declarations.
Cathy M. Trudinger, Paul J. Fraser, David M. Etheridge, William T. Sturges, Martin K. Vollmer, Matt Rigby, Patricia Martinerie, Jens Mühle, David R. Worton, Paul B. Krummel, L. Paul Steele, Benjamin R. Miller, Johannes Laube, Francis S. Mani, Peter J. Rayner, Christina M. Harth, Emmanuel Witrant, Thomas Blunier, Jakob Schwander, Simon O'Doherty, and Mark Battle
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 11733–11754, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-11733-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-11733-2016, 2016
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Perfluorocarbons (PFCs) are potent, long-lived and mostly man-made greenhouse gases released to the atmosphere mainly during aluminium production and semiconductor manufacture. Here we present the first continuous histories of three PFCs from 1800 to 2014, derived from measurements of these PFCs in the atmosphere and in air bubbles in polar ice. The records show how human actions have affected these important greenhouse gases over the past century.
Mark F. Lunt, Matt Rigby, Anita L. Ganesan, and Alistair J. Manning
Geosci. Model Dev., 9, 3213–3229, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-3213-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-3213-2016, 2016
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Bayesian inversions can be used to estimate emissions of gases from atmospheric data. We present an inversion framework that objectively defines the basis functions, which describe regions of emissions. The framework allows for the uncertainty in the choice of basis functions to be propagated through to the posterior emissions distribution in a single-step process, and provides an alternative to using a single set of basis functions.
Michael F. Schibig, Emmanuel Mahieu, Stephan Henne, Bernard Lejeune, and Markus C. Leuenberger
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 9935–9949, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-9935-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-9935-2016, 2016
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Two CO2 time series measured at the High Alpine Research Station Jungfraujoch, Switzerland (3580 m a.s.l.), in the period from 2005 to 2013 were compared. One data set was measured in situ whereas the other data set was measured in the column above Jungfraujoch. The trends of the column integrated and the in situ data set are in good agreement, the amplitude of the in situ data set is ca. two times the amplitude of the column integrated data set, because it is closer to the sources and sinks.
Emiliano Stopelli, Franz Conen, Cindy E. Morris, Erik Herrmann, Stephan Henne, Martin Steinbacher, and Christine Alewell
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 8341–8351, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-8341-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-8341-2016, 2016
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Knowing the variability of ice nucleating particles (INPs) helps determining their role in the formation of precipitation. Here we describe and predict the concentrations of INPs active at −8 °C in precipitation samples collected at Jungfraujoch (CH, 3580 m a.s.l.). A high abundance of these INPs can be expected whenever a coincidence of high wind speed and first precipitation from an air mass occurs. This expands the set of conditions where such INPs could affect the onset of precipitation.
Joe McNorton, Martyn P. Chipperfield, Manuel Gloor, Chris Wilson, Wuhu Feng, Garry D. Hayman, Matt Rigby, Paul B. Krummel, Simon O'Doherty, Ronald G. Prinn, Ray F. Weiss, Dickon Young, Ed Dlugokencky, and Steve A. Montzka
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 7943–7956, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-7943-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-7943-2016, 2016
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Methane (CH4) is an important greenhouse gas. The growth of atmospheric CH4 stalled from 1999 to 2006, with current explanations focussed mainly on changing surface fluxes. We combine models with observations and meteorological data to assess the atmospheric contribution to CH4 changes. We find that variations in mean atmospheric hydroxyl concentration can explain part of the stall in growth. Our study highlights the role of multi-annual variability in atmospheric chemistry in global CH4 trends.
Florian Berkes, Peter Hoor, Heiko Bozem, Daniel Kunkel, Michael Sprenger, and Stephan Henne
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 6011–6025, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-6011-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-6011-2016, 2016
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We presented airborne measurements of CO2 and O3 across the entrainment zone over a semi-remote environment in southwestern Germany in late summer 2011 .
For the first time CO2 and O3 were used as tracer to identify mixing through this transport barrier. We demonstrated that the tracer--tracer correlation of CO2 and O3 is a powerful tool to identify entrainment and mixing.
Ece Satar, Tesfaye A. Berhanu, Dominik Brunner, Stephan Henne, and Markus Leuenberger
Biogeosciences, 13, 2623–2635, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-13-2623-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-13-2623-2016, 2016
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Beromünster tall tower is the flagship of the densely placed Swiss greenhouse gas observation network (CarboCount CH). In this research article we report the first 2 years of the continuous greenhouse gas measurements using cavity ring down spectroscopy analyzer from this tall tower. We have adopted a purely observation based, multi-species and multi-level approach to characterize the site with respect to sources and sinks of natural and anthropogenic origin at diurnal to annual timescales.
Stephan Henne, Dominik Brunner, Brian Oney, Markus Leuenberger, Werner Eugster, Ines Bamberger, Frank Meinhardt, Martin Steinbacher, and Lukas Emmenegger
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 3683–3710, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3683-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3683-2016, 2016
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Greenhouse gas emissions can be assessed by "top-down" methods that combine atmospheric observations, a transport model and a mathematical optimisation framework. Here, we apply such a top-down method to the methane emissions of Switzerland, utilising observations from the recently installed CarboCount-CH network. Our Swiss total emissions largely agree with those of the national "bottom-up" inventory, whereas regional differences suggest lower than reported emissions from manure handling.
M. Chirkov, G. P. Stiller, A. Laeng, S. Kellmann, T. von Clarmann, C. D. Boone, J. W. Elkins, A. Engel, N. Glatthor, U. Grabowski, C. M. Harth, M. Kiefer, F. Kolonjari, P. B. Krummel, A. Linden, C. R. Lunder, B. R. Miller, S. A. Montzka, J. Mühle, S. O'Doherty, J. Orphal, R. G. Prinn, G. Toon, M. K. Vollmer, K. A. Walker, R. F. Weiss, A. Wiegele, and D. Young
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 3345–3368, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3345-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3345-2016, 2016
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HCFC-22 global distributions from MIPAS measurements for 2005 to 2012 are presented. Tropospheric trends are in good agreement with ground-based observations. A layer of enhanced HCFC-22 in the upper tropospheric tropics and northern subtropics is identified to come from Asian sources uplifted in the Asian monsoon. Stratospheric distributions provide show seasonal, semi-annual, and QBO-related variations. Hemispheric asymmetries of trends hint towards a change in the stratospheric circulation.
Xuekun Fang, Min Shao, Andreas Stohl, Qiang Zhang, Junyu Zheng, Hai Guo, Chen Wang, Ming Wang, Jiamin Ou, Rona L. Thompson, and Ronald G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 3369–3382, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3369-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3369-2016, 2016
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This is the first study reporting top-down estimates of benzene and toluene emissions in southern China using atmospheric measurement data from a rural site in the area, an atmospheric transport model and an inverse modeling method. This study shows in detail the temporal and spatial differences between the inversion estimate and four different bottom-up emission inventories (RCP, REAS, MEIC; Yin et al., 2015). We propose that more observations are urgently needed in future.
Stig B. Dalsøren, Cathrine L. Myhre, Gunnar Myhre, Angel J. Gomez-Pelaez, Ole A. Søvde, Ivar S. A. Isaksen, Ray F. Weiss, and Christina M. Harth
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 3099–3126, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3099-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-3099-2016, 2016
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Methane is a key greenhouse gas. Observations at surface sites show a more than 10 % increase over the period 1984–2012. Using an atmospheric model we calculate a growth in the atmospheric chemical methane loss the last decades. Without this, the rise in atmospheric methane would have been even higher. The model reproduces trends and short-term variations in observation data. However, some discrepancies in model performance question the accuracy in estimates of emission increases in Asia.
P. G. Simmonds, M. Rigby, A. J. Manning, M. F. Lunt, S. O'Doherty, A. McCulloch, P. J. Fraser, S. Henne, M. K. Vollmer, J. Mühle, R. F. Weiss, P. K. Salameh, D. Young, S. Reimann, A. Wenger, T. Arnold, C. M. Harth, P. B. Krummel, L. P. Steele, B. L. Dunse, B. R. Miller, C. R. Lunder, O. Hermansen, N. Schmidbauer, T. Saito, Y. Yokouchi, S. Park, S. Li, B. Yao, L. X. Zhou, J. Arduini, M. Maione, R. H. J. Wang, D. Ivy, and R. G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 365–382, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-365-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-365-2016, 2016
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We report regional and global emissions estimates of HFC-152a using high frequency measurements from 11 observing sites and archived air samples dating back to 1978 together with atmospheric transport models. The "bottom-up" emissions of HFC-152a reported to the UNFCCC appear to significantly underestimate those reported here from observations. This discrepancy we suggest arises from largely underestimated USA and undeclared Asian emissions.
S. J. Lawson, M. D. Keywood, I. E. Galbally, J. L. Gras, J. M. Cainey, M. E. Cope, P. B. Krummel, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, S. T. Bentley, C. P. Meyer, Z. Ristovski, and A. H. Goldstein
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 13393–13411, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-13393-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-13393-2015, 2015
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Biomass burning (BB) plumes were opportunistically measured at the Cape Grim Baseline Station in Tasmania, Australia. We provide a unique set of trace gas and particle emission factors for temperate Australian coastal heathland fires, and attribute a major short-lived enhancement in emission ratios to a minor rainfall event. The ability of BB particles to act as cloud condensation nuclei, and the contribution of BB emissions to observed particle growth and ozone enhancements are discussed.
M. K. Kajos, P. Rantala, M. Hill, H. Hellén, J. Aalto, J. Patokoski, R. Taipale, C. C. Hoerger, S. Reimann, T. M. Ruuskanen, J. Rinne, and T. Petäjä
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 8, 4453–4473, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-4453-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-4453-2015, 2015
R. Fröhlich, M. J. Cubison, J. G. Slowik, N. Bukowiecki, F. Canonaco, P. L. Croteau, M. Gysel, S. Henne, E. Herrmann, J. T. Jayne, M. Steinbacher, D. R. Worsnop, U. Baltensperger, and A. S. H. Prévôt
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 11373–11398, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-11373-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-11373-2015, 2015
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This manuscript presents the first long-term (14-month) and highly time-resolved (10 min) measurements of NR-PM1 aerosol chemical composition at a high-altitude site (JFJ, Switzerland, 3580m a.s.l.). The elevated location allowed the investigation of free tropospheric aerosol year round. Total and relative mass loadings, diurnal variations as well as seasonal variations are discussed together with geographical origin, organic aerosol sources and the influence of the planetary boundary layer.
K. C. Wells, D. B. Millet, N. Bousserez, D. K. Henze, S. Chaliyakunnel, T. J. Griffis, Y. Luan, E. J. Dlugokencky, R. G. Prinn, S. O'Doherty, R. F. Weiss, G. S. Dutton, J. W. Elkins, P. B. Krummel, R. Langenfelds, L. P. Steele, E. A. Kort, S. C. Wofsy, and T. Umezawa
Geosci. Model Dev., 8, 3179–3198, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-8-3179-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-8-3179-2015, 2015
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This paper introduces a new inversion framework for N2O using GEOS-Chem and its adjoint, which we employed in a series of observing system simulation experiments to evaluate the source and sink constraints provided by surface and aircraft-based N2O measurements. We also applied a new approach for estimating a posteriori uncertainty for high-dimensional inversions, and used it to quantify the spatial and temporal resolution of N2O emission constraints achieved with the current observing network.
B. Oney, S. Henne, N. Gruber, M. Leuenberger, I. Bamberger, W. Eugster, and D. Brunner
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 11147–11164, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-11147-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-11147-2015, 2015
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We present a detailed analysis of a new greenhouse gas measurement network
in the Swiss Plateau, situated between the Jura mountains and the Alps. We
find the network's measurements to be information rich and suitable
for studying surface carbon fluxes of the study region. However, we are
limited by the high-resolution (2km) atmospheric transport model's ability
to simulate meteorology at the individual measurement stations, especially
at those situated in rough terrain.
C. C. Hoerger, A. Claude, C. Plass-Duelmer, S. Reimann, E. Eckart, R. Steinbrecher, J. Aalto, J. Arduini, N. Bonnaire, J. N. Cape, A. Colomb, R. Connolly, J. Diskova, P. Dumitrean, C. Ehlers, V. Gros, H. Hakola, M. Hill, J. R. Hopkins, J. Jäger, R. Junek, M. K. Kajos, D. Klemp, M. Leuchner, A. C. Lewis, N. Locoge, M. Maione, D. Martin, K. Michl, E. Nemitz, S. O'Doherty, P. Pérez Ballesta, T. M. Ruuskanen, S. Sauvage, N. Schmidbauer, T. G. Spain, E. Straube, M. Vana, M. K. Vollmer, R. Wegener, and A. Wenger
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 8, 2715–2736, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-2715-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-8-2715-2015, 2015
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The performance of 20 European laboratories involved in long-term non-methane hydrocarbon (NMHC) measurements was assessed with respect to ACTRIS and GAW data quality objectives. The participants were asked to measure both a 30-component NMHC mixture in nitrogen and whole air. The NMHCs were analysed either by GC-FID or GC-MS. Most systems performed well for the NMHC in nitrogen, whereas in air more scatter was observed. Reasons for this are explained in the paper.
A. L. Ganesan, A. J. Manning, A. Grant, D. Young, D .E. Oram, W. T. Sturges, J. B. Moncrieff, and S. O'Doherty
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 6393–6406, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-6393-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-6393-2015, 2015
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The UK is one of several countries to enact legislation to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. We present top-down emissions of methane and nitrous oxide for the UK and Ireland over 2012-2014. We inferred average UK emissions of 2.09Tg/yr CH4 and 0.101Tg/yr N2O and used sectoral distributions to determine whether these discrepancies can be attributed to specific source sectors. We found the agricultural sector likely to be overestimated in the bottom-up emissions inventories of both gases.
J. A. Fisher, S. R. Wilson, G. Zeng, J. E. Williams, L. K. Emmons, R. L. Langenfelds, P. B. Krummel, and L. P. Steele
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 3217–3239, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-3217-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-3217-2015, 2015
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The Southern Hemisphere (SH) serves as an important test bed for evaluating our understanding of the processes that drive the composition of the clean background atmosphere. Using data from two aircraft campaigns, combined with four atmospheric chemistry models, we find a large sensitivity in the remote SH to biogenic emissions and their subsequent chemistry and transport. Future model evaluation and measurement campaigns should prioritize reducing uncertainties in these processes.
A. Ghosh, P. K. Patra, K. Ishijima, T. Umezawa, A. Ito, D. M. Etheridge, S. Sugawara, K. Kawamura, J. B. Miller, E. J. Dlugokencky, P. B. Krummel, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, R. L. Langenfelds, C. M. Trudinger, J. W. C. White, B. Vaughn, T. Saeki, S. Aoki, and T. Nakazawa
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 2595–2612, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-2595-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-2595-2015, 2015
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Atmospheric CH4 increased from 900ppb to 1800ppb during the period 1900–2010 at a rate unprecedented in any observational records. We use bottom-up emissions and a chemistry-transport model to simulate CH4. The optimized global total CH4 emission, estimated from the model–observation differences, increased at fastest rate during 1940–1990. Using δ13C of CH4 measurements we attribute this emission increase to biomass burning. Total CH4 lifetime is shortened by 4% over the simulation period.
P. Bergamaschi, M. Corazza, U. Karstens, M. Athanassiadou, R. L. Thompson, I. Pison, A. J. Manning, P. Bousquet, A. Segers, A. T. Vermeulen, G. Janssens-Maenhout, M. Schmidt, M. Ramonet, F. Meinhardt, T. Aalto, L. Haszpra, J. Moncrieff, M. E. Popa, D. Lowry, M. Steinbacher, A. Jordan, S. O'Doherty, S. Piacentino, and E. Dlugokencky
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 715–736, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-715-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-715-2015, 2015
Z. M. Loh, R. M. Law, K. D. Haynes, P. B. Krummel, L. P. Steele, P. J. Fraser, S. D. Chambers, and A. G. Williams
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 305–317, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-305-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-305-2015, 2015
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The paper compares methane observations at Cape Grim, Tasmania, with model-simulated methane to better constrain methane fluxes from southeastern Australia. Inventory estimates of anthropogenic methane emissions appear to be supported by observed atmospheric methane. A missing methane source in springtime (October to November) is tentatively attributed to wetland emissions.
S. J. O'Shea, G. Allen, M. W. Gallagher, K. Bower, S. M. Illingworth, J. B. A. Muller, B. T. Jones, C. J. Percival, S. J-B. Bauguitte, M. Cain, N. Warwick, A. Quiquet, U. Skiba, J. Drewer, K. Dinsmore, E. G. Nisbet, D. Lowry, R. E. Fisher, J. L. France, M. Aurela, A. Lohila, G. Hayman, C. George, D. B. Clark, A. J. Manning, A. D. Friend, and J. Pyle
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 13159–13174, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-13159-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-13159-2014, 2014
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This paper presents airborne measurements of greenhouse gases collected in the European Arctic. Regional scale flux estimates for the northern Scandinavian wetlands are derived. These fluxes are found to be in excellent agreement with coincident surface measurements within the aircraft's sampling domain. This has allowed a significant low bias to be identified in two commonly used process-based land surface models.
A. Fraser, P. I. Palmer, L. Feng, H. Bösch, R. Parker, E. J. Dlugokencky, P. B. Krummel, and R. L. Langenfelds
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 12883–12895, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-12883-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-12883-2014, 2014
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Satellite measurements of CO2 and CH4 can be subject to regional systematic errors that can consequently compromise their ability to infer robust flux estimates of these two gases. We develop a method to use retrieved ratios of CH4 and CO2 that are less affected by systematic error. We show that additional in situ data are needed to anchor these observed ratios so they can simultaneously infer fluxes of CO2 and CH4. We argue the ratio data will provide a more faithful description of true fluxes.
S. Pandey Deolal, S. Henne, L. Ries, S. Gilge, U. Weers, M. Steinbacher, J. Staehelin, and T. Peter
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 12553–12571, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-12553-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-12553-2014, 2014
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Mixing ratios of Peroxyacetyl nitrate (PAN) at Jungfraujoch (Switzerland) and Zugspitze (Germany) show a seasonal variation with maxima in spring, typical for remote sites in the lower atmosphere in northern mid-latitudes. The detailed analysis of PAN measurements of May 2008 indicates that PAN at these high mountain sites is dominated by photochemical formation in the relatively cold polluted European planetary boundary layer rather than formation in the free troposphere.
W. Bader, T. Stavrakou, J.-F. Muller, S. Reimann, C. D. Boone, J. J. Harrison, O. Flock, B. Bovy, B. Franco, B. Lejeune, C. Servais, and E. Mahieu
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 7, 3861–3872, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-3861-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-3861-2014, 2014
M. Maione, F. Graziosi, J. Arduini, F. Furlani, U. Giostra, D. R. Blake, P. Bonasoni, X. Fang, S. A. Montzka, S. J. O'Doherty, S. Reimann, A. Stohl, and M. K. Vollmer
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 9755–9770, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9755-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9755-2014, 2014
S. O'Doherty, M. Rigby, J. Mühle, D. J. Ivy, B. R. Miller, D. Young, P. G. Simmonds, S. Reimann, M. K. Vollmer, P. B. Krummel, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, B. Dunse, P. K. Salameh, C. M. Harth, T. Arnold, R. F. Weiss, J. Kim, S. Park, S. Li, C. Lunder, O. Hermansen, N. Schmidbauer, L. X. Zhou, B. Yao, R. H. J. Wang, A. J. Manning, and R. G. Prinn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 9249–9258, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9249-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9249-2014, 2014
R. L. Thompson, K. Ishijima, E. Saikawa, M. Corazza, U. Karstens, P. K. Patra, P. Bergamaschi, F. Chevallier, E. Dlugokencky, R. G. Prinn, R. F. Weiss, S. O'Doherty, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, P. B. Krummel, A. Vermeulen, Y. Tohjima, A. Jordan, L. Haszpra, M. Steinbacher, S. Van der Laan, T. Aalto, F. Meinhardt, M. E. Popa, J. Moncrieff, and P. Bousquet
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 6177–6194, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-6177-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-6177-2014, 2014
X. Fang, R. L. Thompson, T. Saito, Y. Yokouchi, J. Kim, S. Li, K. R. Kim, S. Park, F. Graziosi, and A. Stohl
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 4779–4791, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-4779-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-4779-2014, 2014
E. Saikawa, R. G. Prinn, E. Dlugokencky, K. Ishijima, G. S. Dutton, B. D. Hall, R. Langenfelds, Y. Tohjima, T. Machida, M. Manizza, M. Rigby, S. O'Doherty, P. K. Patra, C. M. Harth, R. F. Weiss, P. B. Krummel, M. van der Schoot, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, S. Aoki, T. Nakazawa, and J. W. Elkins
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 4617–4641, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-4617-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-4617-2014, 2014
R. L. Thompson, P. K. Patra, K. Ishijima, E. Saikawa, M. Corazza, U. Karstens, C. Wilson, P. Bergamaschi, E. Dlugokencky, C. Sweeney, R. G. Prinn, R. F. Weiss, S. O'Doherty, P. J. Fraser, L. P. Steele, P. B. Krummel, M. Saunois, M. Chipperfield, and P. Bousquet
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 4349–4368, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-4349-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-4349-2014, 2014
A. L. Ganesan, M. Rigby, A. Zammit-Mangion, A. J. Manning, R. G. Prinn, P. J. Fraser, C. M. Harth, K.-R. Kim, P. B. Krummel, S. Li, J. Mühle, S. J. O'Doherty, S. Park, P. K. Salameh, L. P. Steele, and R. F. Weiss
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 3855–3864, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-3855-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-3855-2014, 2014
M. E. Popa, M. K. Vollmer, A. Jordan, W. A. Brand, S. L. Pathirana, M. Rothe, and T. Röckmann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 2105–2123, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-2105-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-2105-2014, 2014
R. L. Thompson, F. Chevallier, A. M. Crotwell, G. Dutton, R. L. Langenfelds, R. G. Prinn, R. F. Weiss, Y. Tohjima, T. Nakazawa, P. B. Krummel, L. P. Steele, P. Fraser, S. O'Doherty, K. Ishijima, and S. Aoki
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 1801–1817, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-1801-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-1801-2014, 2014
B. D. Hall, A. Engel, J. Mühle, J. W. Elkins, F. Artuso, E. Atlas, M. Aydin, D. Blake, E.-G. Brunke, S. Chiavarini, P. J. Fraser, J. Happell, P. B. Krummel, I. Levin, M. Loewenstein, M. Maione, S. A. Montzka, S. O'Doherty, S. Reimann, G. Rhoderick, E. S. Saltzman, H. E. Scheel, L. P. Steele, M. K. Vollmer, R. F. Weiss, D. Worthy, and Y. Yokouchi
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 7, 469–490, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-469-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-469-2014, 2014
E. Mahieu, R. Zander, G. C. Toon, M. K. Vollmer, S. Reimann, J. Mühle, W. Bader, B. Bovy, B. Lejeune, C. Servais, P. Demoulin, G. Roland, P. F. Bernath, C. D. Boone, K. A. Walker, and P. Duchatelet
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 7, 333–344, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-333-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-333-2014, 2014
M. J. Ashfold, N. R. P. Harris, A. J. Manning, A. D. Robinson, N. J. Warwick, and J. A. Pyle
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 979–994, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-979-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-979-2014, 2014
C. Cressot, F. Chevallier, P. Bousquet, C. Crevoisier, E. J. Dlugokencky, A. Fortems-Cheiney, C. Frankenberg, R. Parker, I. Pison, R. A. Scheepmaker, S. A. Montzka, P. B. Krummel, L. P. Steele, and R. L. Langenfelds
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 577–592, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-577-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-577-2014, 2014
A. L. Ganesan, A. Chatterjee, R. G. Prinn, C. M. Harth, P. K. Salameh, A. J. Manning, B. D. Hall, J. Mühle, L. K. Meredith, R. F. Weiss, S. O'Doherty, and D. Young
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 10633–10644, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-10633-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-10633-2013, 2013
R. Locatelli, P. Bousquet, F. Chevallier, A. Fortems-Cheney, S. Szopa, M. Saunois, A. Agusti-Panareda, D. Bergmann, H. Bian, P. Cameron-Smith, M. P. Chipperfield, E. Gloor, S. Houweling, S. R. Kawa, M. Krol, P. K. Patra, R. G. Prinn, M. Rigby, R. Saito, and C. Wilson
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 9917–9937, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-9917-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-9917-2013, 2013
S. Basu, S. Guerlet, A. Butz, S. Houweling, O. Hasekamp, I. Aben, P. Krummel, P. Steele, R. Langenfelds, M. Torn, S. Biraud, B. Stephens, A. Andrews, and D. Worthy
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 8695–8717, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-8695-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-8695-2013, 2013
V. V. Petrenko, P. Martinerie, P. Novelli, D. M. Etheridge, I. Levin, Z. Wang, T. Blunier, J. Chappellaz, J. Kaiser, P. Lang, L. P. Steele, S. Hammer, J. Mak, R. L. Langenfelds, J. Schwander, J. P. Severinghaus, E. Witrant, G. Petron, M. O. Battle, G. Forster, W. T. Sturges, J.-F. Lamarque, K. Steffen, and J. W. C. White
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 7567–7585, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-7567-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-7567-2013, 2013
P. Sturm, B. Tuzson, S. Henne, and L. Emmenegger
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 6, 1659–1671, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-6-1659-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-6-1659-2013, 2013
A. Fraser, P. I. Palmer, L. Feng, H. Boesch, A. Cogan, R. Parker, E. J. Dlugokencky, P. J. Fraser, P. B. Krummel, R. L. Langenfelds, S. O'Doherty, R. G. Prinn, L. P. Steele, M. van der Schoot, and R. F. Weiss
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 5697–5713, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-5697-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-5697-2013, 2013
L. R. Welp, R. F. Keeling, R. F. Weiss, W. Paplawsky, and S. Heckman
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 6, 1217–1226, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-6-1217-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-6-1217-2013, 2013
C. E. Yver, H. D. Graven, D. D. Lucas, P. J. Cameron-Smith, R. F. Keeling, and R. F. Weiss
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 1837–1852, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-1837-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-1837-2013, 2013
C. M. Trudinger, I. G. Enting, P. J. Rayner, D. M. Etheridge, C. Buizert, M. Rubino, P. B. Krummel, and T. Blunier
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 1485–1510, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-1485-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-1485-2013, 2013
D. A. Belikov, S. Maksyutov, M. Krol, A. Fraser, M. Rigby, H. Bian, A. Agusti-Panareda, D. Bergmann, P. Bousquet, P. Cameron-Smith, M. P. Chipperfield, A. Fortems-Cheiney, E. Gloor, K. Haynes, P. Hess, S. Houweling, S. R. Kawa, R. M. Law, Z. Loh, L. Meng, P. I. Palmer, P. K. Patra, R. G. Prinn, R. Saito, and C. Wilson
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 1093–1114, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-1093-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-1093-2013, 2013
Related subject area
Subject: Gases | Research Activity: Field Measurements | Altitude Range: Troposphere | Science Focus: Physics (physical properties and processes)
Seasonal patterns of atmospheric mercury in tropical South America as inferred by a continuous total gaseous mercury record at Chacaltaya station (5240 m) in Bolivia
A mass-weighted isentropic coordinate for mapping chemical tracers and computing atmospheric inventories
Convergent Estimates of Biomass Burning-Derived Atmospheric Ammonia in Peninsular Southeast Asia
Concurrent variation in oil and gas methane emissions and oil price during the COVID-19 pandemic
Methane mapping, emission quantification, and attribution in two European cities: Utrecht (NL) and Hamburg (DE)
Ozone affected by a succession of four landfall typhoons in the Yangtze River Delta, China: major processes and health impacts
4D dispersion of total gaseous mercury derived from a mining source: identification of criteria to assess risks related to high concentrations of atmospheric mercury
Estimating CH4, CO2 and CO emissions from coal mining and industrial activities in the Upper Silesian Coal Basin using an aircraft-based mass balance approach
Dynamic Processes Dominating Ozone Variability in Warm Seasons of 2014–2018 over the Yangtze River Delta Region, China
Profiling of formaldehyde, glyoxal, methylglyoxal, and CO over the Amazon: normalized excess mixing ratios and related emission factors in biomass burning plumes
Measurement report: Leaf-scale gas exchange of atmospheric reactive trace species (NO2, NO, O3) at a northern hardwood forest in Michigan
A dedicated flask sampling strategy developed for Integrated Carbon Observation System (ICOS) stations based on CO2 and CO measurements and Stochastic Time-Inverted Lagrangian Transport (STILT) footprint modelling
Understanding nighttime methane signals at the Amazon Tall Tower Observatory (ATTO)
Background heterogeneity and other uncertainties in estimating urban methane flux: results from the Indianapolis Flux Experiment (INFLUX)
Methane emissions from the Munich Oktoberfest
A study of the influence of tropospheric subsidence on spring and summer surface ozone concentrations at the JRC Ispra station in northern Italy
Local and synoptic meteorological influences on daily variability in summertime surface ozone in eastern China
Variability in a four-network composite of atmospheric CO2 differences between three primary baseline sites
Quantifying the impact of synoptic circulation patterns on ozone variability in northern China from April to October 2013–2017
Multivariate statistical air mass classification for the high-alpine observatory at the Zugspitze Mountain, Germany
Evolution of anthropogenic air pollutant emissions in Guangdong Province, China, from 2006 to 2015
Speciated atmospheric mercury and sea–air exchange of gaseous mercury in the South China Sea
Methane emissions from oil and gas platforms in the North Sea
Assessing London CO2, CH4 and CO emissions using aircraft measurements and dispersion modelling
2005–2017 ozone trends and potential benefits of local measures as deduced from air quality measurements in the north of the Barcelona metropolitan area
Country-scale greenhouse gas budgets using shipborne measurements: a case study for the UK and Ireland
Intercomparison of midlatitude tropospheric and lower-stratospheric water vapor measurements and comparison to ECMWF humidity data
Eddy flux measurements of sulfur dioxide deposition to the sea surface
Quantifying uncertainties from mobile-laboratory-derived emissions of well pads using inverse Gaussian methods
Observing local CO2 sources using low-cost, near-surface urban monitors
Spatiotemporal variability of NO2 and PM2.5 over Eastern China: observational and model analyses with a novel statistical method
Spatial–temporal patterns of inorganic nitrogen air concentrations and deposition in eastern China
Phenomenology of summer ozone episodes over the Madrid Metropolitan Area, central Spain
Ship-based MAX-DOAS measurements of tropospheric NO2, SO2, and HCHO distribution along the Yangtze River
Gradient flux measurements of sea–air DMS transfer during the Surface Ocean Aerosol Production (SOAP) experiment
Measurements of atmospheric ethene by solar absorption FTIR spectrometry
Ozone pollution around a coastal region of South China Sea: interaction between marine and continental air
Abundance and sources of atmospheric halocarbons in the Eastern Mediterranean
Diurnal, synoptic and seasonal variability of atmospheric CO2 in the Paris megacity area
Atmospheric carbonyl sulfide (OCS) measured remotely by FTIR solar absorption spectrometry
Temporal variation of VOC fluxes measured with PTR-TOF above a boreal forest
Long-term trends of surface ozone and its influencing factors at the Mt Waliguan GAW station, China – Part 2: The roles of anthropogenic emissions and climate variability
Gaseous elemental mercury (GEM) fluxes over canopy of two typical subtropical forests in south China
Observations of ozone depletion events in a Finnish boreal forest
Mobile measurement of methane emissions from natural gas developments in northeastern British Columbia, Canada
Impacts of large-scale circulation on urban ambient concentrations of gaseous elemental mercury in New York, USA
Surface ozone at Nam Co in the inland Tibetan Plateau: variation, synthesis comparison and regional representativeness
Trends and annual cycles in soundings of Arctic tropospheric ozone
Estimation of bubble-mediated air–sea gas exchange from concurrent DMS and CO2 transfer velocities at intermediate–high wind speeds
Estimating the size of a methane emission point source at different scales: from local to landscape
Alkuin Maximilian Koenig, Olivier Magand, Paolo Laj, Marcos Andrade, Isabel Moreno, Fernando Velarde, Grover Salvatierra, René Gutierrez, Luis Blacutt, Diego Aliaga, Thomas Reichler, Karine Sellegri, Olivier Laurent, Michel Ramonet, and Aurélien Dommergue
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 3447–3472, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-3447-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-3447-2021, 2021
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The environmental cycling of atmospheric mercury, a harmful global contaminant, is still not sufficiently constrained, partly due to missing data in remote regions. Here, we address this issue by presenting 20 months of atmospheric mercury measurements, sampled in the Bolivian Andes. We observe a significant seasonal pattern, whose key features we explore. Moreover, we deduce ratios to constrain South American biomass burning mercury emissions and the mercury uptake by the Amazon rainforest.
Yuming Jin, Ralph F. Keeling, Eric J. Morgan, Eric Ray, Nicholas C. Parazoo, and Britton B. Stephens
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 217–238, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-217-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-217-2021, 2021
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We propose a new atmospheric coordinate (Mθe) based on equivalent potential temperature (θe) but with mass as the unit. This coordinate is useful in studying the spatial and temporal distribution of long-lived chemical tracers (CO2, CH4, O2 / N2, etc.) from sparse data, like airborne observation. Using this coordinate and sparse airborne observation (HIPPO and ATom), we resolve the Northern Hemisphere mass-weighted average CO2 seasonal cycle with high accuracy.
Yunhua Chang, Yan-Lin Zhang, Sawaeng Kawichai, Qian Wang, Martin Van Damme, Lieven Clarisse, Tippawan Prapamontol, and Moritz F. Lehmann
Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-1061, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-1061, 2021
Revised manuscript accepted for ACP
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In this study, we integrated satellite constraints on atmospheric NH3 levels and fire intensity, discrete NH3 concentration measurement, and N isotopic analysis of NH3 in order to assess the regional-scale contribution of biomass burning to ambient atmospheric NH3 in the heartland of Southeast Asia. The combined approach provides a valuable cross-validation framework for source apportioning of NH3 in the lower atmosphere and will thus help to ameliorate predictions of biomass burning emissions.
David R. Lyon, Benjamin Hmiel, Ritesh Gautam, Mark Omara, Kate Roberts, Zachary R. Barkley, Kenneth J. David, Natasha L. Miles, Vanessa C. Monteiro, Scott J. Richardson, Stephen Conley, Mackenzie L. Smith, Daniel J. Jacob, Lu Shen, Daniel J. Varon, Aijun Deng, Xander Rudelis, Nikhil Sharma, Kyle T. Story, Adam R. Brandt, Mary Kang, Eric A. Kort, Anthony J. Marchese, and Steven P. Hamburg
Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-1175, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-1175, 2020
Revised manuscript accepted for ACP
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The Permian Basin (United States) is the world's largest oil field. We use tower- and aircraft-based approaches to measure how methane emissions in the Permian changed throughout 2020. In early 2020, 3.4 % of the region's gas was emitted, then in spring 2020, the loss rate temporarily dropped to 1.5 % as oil price crashed. We find this short term reduction to be a result of reduced well development, less gas flaring, and fewer abnormal events despite minimal reductions in oil and gas production.
Hossein Maazallahi, Julianne M. Fernandez, Malika Menoud, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, Zachary D. Weller, Stefan Schwietzke, Joseph C. von Fischer, Hugo Denier van der Gon, and Thomas Röckmann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 14717–14740, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-14717-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-14717-2020, 2020
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Methane accounts for ∼ 25 % of current climate warming. The current lack of methane measurements is a barrier for tracking major sources, which are key for near-term climate mitigation. We use mobile measurements to identify and quantify methane emission sources in Utrecht (NL) and Hamburg (DE) with a focus on natural gas pipeline leaks. The measurements resulted in fixing the major leaks by the local utility, but coordinated efforts are needed at national levels for further emission reductions.
Chenchao Zhan, Min Xie, Chongwu Huang, Jane Liu, Tijian Wang, Meng Xu, Chaoqun Ma, Jianwei Yu, Yumeng Jiao, Mengmeng Li, Shu Li, Bingliang Zhuang, Ming Zhao, and Dongyang Nie
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 13781–13799, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13781-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13781-2020, 2020
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The Yangtze River Delta (YRD) region has been suffering from severe ozone (O3) pollution in recent years. Synoptic systems, like typhoons, can have a significant effect on O3 episodes. However, research on landfall typhoons affecting O3 in the YRD is limited. This work aims to reveal the main processes of landfall typhoons affecting surface O3 and estimate health impacts of O3 during the study period in the YRD, which can be useful for taking reasonable pollution control measures in this area.
José M. Esbrí, Pablo L. Higueras, Alba Martínez-Coronado, and Rocío Naharro
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 12995–13010, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12995-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12995-2020, 2020
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The aim of this work was to identify criteria to obtain the minimum amount of data with the maximum meaning and representativeness in order to delimit risk areas, both in a spatial and temporal respect. We have constructed a model of vertical mercury movements which could be used to predict the location and timing of mercury inhalation risk. Also, we have designed a monitoring strategy to identify the relevant criteria, which involved the measurement of gaseous mercury in a vertical section.
Alina Fiehn, Julian Kostinek, Maximilian Eckl, Theresa Klausner, Michał Gałkowski, Jinxuan Chen, Christoph Gerbig, Thomas Röckmann, Hossein Maazallahi, Martina Schmidt, Piotr Korbeń, Jarosław Neçki, Pawel Jagoda, Norman Wildmann, Christian Mallaun, Rostyslav Bun, Anna-Leah Nickl, Patrick Jöckel, Andreas Fix, and Anke Roiger
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 12675–12695, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12675-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12675-2020, 2020
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A severe reduction of greenhouse gas emissions is necessary to fulfill the Paris Agreement. We use aircraft- and ground-based in situ observations of trace gases and wind speed from two flights over the Upper Silesian Coal Basin, Poland, for independent emission estimation. The derived methane emission estimates are within the range of emission inventories, carbon dioxide estimates are in the lower range and carbon monoxide emission estimates are slightly higher than emission inventory values.
Da Gao, Min Xie, Jane Liu, Tijian Wang, Chaoqun Ma, Haokun Bai, and Xing Chen
Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-902, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2020-902, 2020
Revised manuscript accepted for ACP
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O3 becomes the ever-growing in recent years over the Yangtze River Delta region of China, and is closely associated with dominant weather systems. Still, the study on the impact of changes in synoptic weather patterns (SWPs) on O3 variation is quite limited. This work aims to reveal the unique feature of changes in each SWP under O3 variation, and quantifies the effects of meteorological conditions on O3 variation. Our findings could be helpful to the strategy-planning for O3 pollution control.
Flora Kluge, Tilman Hüneke, Matthias Knecht, Michael Lichtenstern, Meike Rotermund, Hans Schlager, Benjamin Schreiner, and Klaus Pfeilsticker
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 12363–12389, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12363-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-12363-2020, 2020
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The presented study reports on airborne measurements of formaldehyde, glyoxal, methylglyoxal, and CO over the Amazon basin and lays a special focus on the influence of biomass burning emissions on the atmospheric profiles of these carbonyl compounds within the planetary boundary layer as well as in the free and upper troposphere.
Wei Wang, Laurens Ganzeveld, Samuel Rossabi, Jacques Hueber, and Detlev Helmig
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 11287–11304, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-11287-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-11287-2020, 2020
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Trees exchange with the atmosphere nitrogen oxides and ozone, affecting the tropospheric composition and consequently air quality and ecosystem health. We examined the leaf-level gas exchanges for four typical tree species (pine, maple, oak, aspen) found in northern Michigan, US. The leaves largely absorb the gases, showing little evidence of emission. We measured the uptake rates that can be used to improve model studies of the source and sink processes controlling these gases in forests.
Ingeborg Levin, Ute Karstens, Markus Eritt, Fabian Maier, Sabrina Arnold, Daniel Rzesanke, Samuel Hammer, Michel Ramonet, Gabriela Vítková, Sebastien Conil, Michal Heliasz, Dagmar Kubistin, and Matthias Lindauer
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 11161–11180, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-11161-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-11161-2020, 2020
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Based on observations and Stochastic Time-Inverted Lagrangian Transport (STILT) footprint modelling, a sampling strategy has been developed for tall tower stations of the Integrated Carbon Observation System (ICOS) research infrastructure atmospheric station network. This strategy allows independent quality control of in situ measurements, provides representative coverage of the influence area of the sites, and is capable of automated targeted sampling of fossil fuel CO2 emission hotspots.
Santiago Botía, Christoph Gerbig, Julia Marshall, Jost V. Lavric, David Walter, Christopher Pöhlker, Bruna Holanda, Gilberto Fisch, Alessandro Carioca de Araújo, Marta O. Sá, Paulo R. Teixeira, Angélica F. Resende, Cleo Q. Dias-Junior, Hella van Asperen, Pablo S. Oliveira, Michel Stefanello, and Otávio C. Acevedo
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 6583–6606, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-6583-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-6583-2020, 2020
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A long record of atmospheric methane concentrations in central Amazonia was analyzed. We describe events in which concentrations at 79 m are higher than at 4 m. These events are more frequent during the nighttime of dry season, but we found no association with fire signals. Instead, we suggest that a combination of nighttime transport and a nearby source could explain such events. Our research gives insights into how methane is transported in the complex nocturnal atmosphere in Amazonia.
Nikolay V. Balashov, Kenneth J. Davis, Natasha L. Miles, Thomas Lauvaux, Scott J. Richardson, Zachary R. Barkley, and Timothy A. Bonin
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 4545–4559, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4545-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4545-2020, 2020
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An accurate independent verification methodology to estimate methane (a powerful greenhouse gas) emissions is essential for the effective implementation of policies that aim to reduce the impacts of climate change. In this paper, four uncertainties that complicate the independent estimation of urban methane emissions are identified: the definition of urban domain, background heterogeneity, emissions temporal variability, and missing sources. Ways to improve emission estimates are suggested.
Jia Chen, Florian Dietrich, Hossein Maazallahi, Andreas Forstmaier, Dominik Winkler, Magdalena E. G. Hofmann, Hugo Denier van der Gon, and Thomas Röckmann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 3683–3696, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-3683-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-3683-2020, 2020
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We demonstrate for the first time that large festivals can be significant methane sources, though they are not included in emission inventories. We combined in situ measurements with a Gaussian plume model to determine the Oktoberfest emissions and show that they are not due solely to human biogenic emissions, but are instead primarily fossil fuel related. Our study provides the foundation to develop reduction policies for such events and new pathways to mitigate fossil fuel methane emissions.
Pavlos Kalabokas, Niels Roland Jensen, Mauro Roveri, Jens Hjorth, Maxim Eremenko, Juan Cuesta, Gaëlle Dufour, Gilles Foret, and Matthias Beekmann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 1861–1885, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-1861-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-1861-2020, 2020
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The influence of tropospheric ozone on the surface measurements at a regional air pollution station in the pre-Alpine area of northern Italy is investigated. During such episodes the local air pollution parameters show generally very low values, while the ozone levels reach high values, occasionally exceeding the ozone air quality standards. Better understanding of ozone variability over the examined region will help in the formulation of more effective policies for the environment and climate.
Han Han, Jane Liu, Lei Shu, Tijian Wang, and Huiling Yuan
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 203–222, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-203-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-203-2020, 2020
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We statistically assessed the impacts of local and synoptic meteorology on daily surface ozone in eastern China in summer during 2013–2018. The results show that the meteorology described by a multiple linear regression model explains 43 % of variations in surface ozone. The most important local meteorological factors vary with location in eastern China. The maximum impact of the predominant synoptic pattern on surface ozone can reach ± 8 µg m-3 or ± 16 % of the daily mean over some regions.
Roger J. Francey, Jorgen S. Frederiksen, L. Paul Steele, and Ray L. Langenfelds
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 14741–14754, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14741-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14741-2019, 2019
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25-year composites of interhemispheric baseline CO2 differences demonstrate close agreement between 4 monitoring networks. Variability from monthly to multiyear time frames mostly reflects variability in upper troposphere dynamical indices chosen to represent eddy and mean transport interhemispheric exchange. Monthly interhemispheric atmospheric fluxes are much larger than air–surface terrestrial exchanges. The composite differences offer unusual constraints on transport in global carbon models.
Jingda Liu, Lili Wang, Mingge Li, Zhiheng Liao, Yang Sun, Tao Song, Wenkang Gao, Yonghong Wang, Yan Li, Dongsheng Ji, Bo Hu, Veli-Matti Kerminen, Yuesi Wang, and Markku Kulmala
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 14477–14492, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14477-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-14477-2019, 2019
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We analyzed the surface ozone variation characteristics and quantified the impact of synoptic and local meteorological factors on northern China during the warm season based on multi-city, in situ ozone and meteorological data, as well as meteorological reanalysis. The results of quantitative exploration on synoptic and local meteorological factors influencing both interannual and day-to-day ozone variations will provide the scientific basis for evaluating emission reduction measures.
Armin Sigmund, Korbinian Freier, Till Rehm, Ludwig Ries, Christian Schunk, Anette Menzel, and Christoph K. Thomas
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 12477–12494, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-12477-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-12477-2019, 2019
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Air masses at the Schneefernerhaus mountain site at Zugspitze Mountain, Germany, were classified with respect to the atmospheric layer from which they originated and their degree of pollution. Measurements of several gases, particulate matter, and standard meteorological quantities indicated that polluted air was lifted to the site in 31 % of cases and clean air descended to the site in approximately 14 % cases while most of the remaining cases were ambiguous.
Yahui Bian, Zhijiong Huang, Jiamin Ou, Zhuangmin Zhong, Yuanqian Xu, Zhiwei Zhang, Xiao Xiao, Xiao Ye, Yuqi Wu, Xiaohong Yin, Cheng Li, Liangfu Chen, Min Shao, and Junyu Zheng
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 11701–11719, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-11701-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-11701-2019, 2019
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During 2006–2015, emissions of SO2, NOx, PM2.5 and PM10 saw an obvious downtrend. However, most emissions still have large reduction potential. On-road mobile sources and solvent use are the two key sources that should receive more effective control measures in GD. Also, controls measures on VOC and NH3 should be weighted since they still increased in 2006–2015. Since most control measures focused on PRD rather than non-PRD in GD, emissions in non-PRD were increasingly important.
Chunjie Wang, Zhangwei Wang, Fan Hui, and Xiaoshan Zhang
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 10111–10127, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-10111-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-10111-2019, 2019
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A low GEM level indicated that the SCS suffered less anthropogenic influence. There was no significant difference in GEM and HgP2.5 values between day and night, but the RGM level was higher in daytime than in nighttime. The size distribution of HgP in PM10 was observed to be bi-modal, but the coarse modal was the dominant size. The annual emission flux of Hg0 from the SCS was estimated to be 159 ton yr-1. The dry deposition was an important pathway for the input of atmospheric Hg to the SCS.
Stuart N. Riddick, Denise L. Mauzerall, Michael Celia, Neil R. P. Harris, Grant Allen, Joseph Pitt, John Staunton-Sykes, Grant L. Forster, Mary Kang, David Lowry, Euan G. Nisbet, and Alistair J. Manning
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 9787–9796, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-9787-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-9787-2019, 2019
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Currently, bottom-up methods estimate that 0.13 % of methane produced by UK North Sea oil and gas installations is lost. Here we measure emissions from eight platforms in the North Sea and, when considered collectively, the methane loss is estimated at 0.19 % of gas production. As this ambient loss is not explicitly accounted for in the bottom-up approach, these measured emissions represent significant additional emissions above previous estimates.
Joseph R. Pitt, Grant Allen, Stéphane J.-B. Bauguitte, Martin W. Gallagher, James D. Lee, Will Drysdale, Beth Nelson, Alistair J. Manning, and Paul I. Palmer
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 8931–8945, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-8931-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-8931-2019, 2019
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This paper presents a new method to assess inventory estimates of greenhouse gas and air pollutant emissions for large cities and their surrounding regions. A case study using data sampled by a research aircraft around London was used to test the method. We found that the UK national inventory agrees with our observations for CO but needed lower emissions for CH4 to agree with the measured data. Repeated studies could help determine how these emissions vary on different timescales.
Jordi Massagué, Cristina Carnerero, Miguel Escudero, José María Baldasano, Andrés Alastuey, and Xavier Querol
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 7445–7465, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-7445-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-7445-2019, 2019
Carole Helfter, Neil Mullinger, Massimo Vieno, Simon O'Doherty, Michel Ramonet, Paul I. Palmer, and Eiko Nemitz
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 3043–3063, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-3043-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-3043-2019, 2019
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We present a novel approach to estimate the annual budgets of carbon dioxide (881.0 ± 128.5 Tg) and methane (2.55 ± 0.48 Tg) of the British Isles from shipborne measurements taken over a 3-year period (2015–2017). This study brings independent verification of the emission budgets estimated using alternative products and investigates the seasonality of these emissions, which is usually not possible.
Stefan Kaufmann, Christiane Voigt, Romy Heller, Tina Jurkat-Witschas, Martina Krämer, Christian Rolf, Martin Zöger, Andreas Giez, Bernhard Buchholz, Volker Ebert, Troy Thornberry, and Ulrich Schumann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 16729–16745, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-16729-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-16729-2018, 2018
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We present an intercomparison of the airborne water vapor measurements during the ML-CIRRUS mission. Although the agreement of the hygrometers significantly improved compared to studies from recent decades, systematic differences remain under specific meteorological conditions. We compare the measurements to model data, where we observe a model wet bias in the lower stratosphere close to the tropopause, likely caused by a blurred humidity gradient in the model tropopause.
Jack G. Porter, Warren De Bruyn, and Eric S. Saltzman
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 15291–15305, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-15291-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-15291-2018, 2018
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Deposition to the sea surface is a major loss pathway for highly soluble atmospheric trace gases. These fluxes are important to biogeochemical cycles, climate, and air quality. Here we report measurements of air–sea fluxes of sulfur dioxide, sensible heat, and momentum to coastal waters. Transfer velocities derived from the data show a dependence on molecular diffusivity, demonstrating the importance of diffusion in the interfacial layer on the atmospheric side of the air–sea interface.
Dana R. Caulton, Qi Li, Elie Bou-Zeid, Jeffrey P. Fitts, Levi M. Golston, Da Pan, Jessica Lu, Haley M. Lane, Bernhard Buchholz, Xuehui Guo, James McSpiritt, Lars Wendt, and Mark A. Zondlo
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 15145–15168, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-15145-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-15145-2018, 2018
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Mobile laboratory measurements have been widely used to quantify methane emissions from point sources such as oil and gas wells, but the emission uncertainties are poorly constrained. We designed a hierarchical measurement strategy to sample natural gas emissions in the Marcellus Shale play based upon high-resolution modeling of select sites. Our study quantifies the largest sources of error with this approach and provides guidance on how to best implement mobile laboratory sampling protocols.
Alexis A. Shusterman, Jinsol Kim, Kaitlyn J. Lieschke, Catherine Newman, Paul J. Wooldridge, and Ronald C. Cohen
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 13773–13785, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-13773-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-13773-2018, 2018
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We describe the diversity and heterogeneity of urban CO2 levels observed using the BErkeley Atmospheric CO2 Observation Network, a distributed instrument of > 50 CO2 sensors stationed every ~ 2 km across the San Francisco Bay Area. We demonstrate that relatively simple mathematical techniques, applied to these observations, can be used to detect the small changes in highway CO2 emissions expected to result from upcoming fuel economy regulations, affirming the policy relevance of low-cost sensors.
Mengyao Liu, Jintai Lin, Yuchen Wang, Yang Sun, Bo Zheng, Jingyuan Shao, Lulu Chen, Yixuan Zheng, Jinxuan Chen, Tzung-May Fu, Yingying Yan, Qiang Zhang, and Zhaohua Wu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 12933–12952, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-12933-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-12933-2018, 2018
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Eastern China is heavily polluted by NO2, PM2.5, and other air pollutants. Our study uses EOF–EEMD to analyze the spatiotemporal variability of ground-level NO2, PM2.5, and their associations with meteorological processes. Their regular diurnal cycles are mainly affected by human activities, while irregular day-to-day variations are dominated by weather processes representing synchronous variation or north–south opposing changes over Eastern China.
Wen Xu, Lei Liu, Miaomiao Cheng, Yuanhong Zhao, Lin Zhang, Yuepeng Pan, Xiuming Zhang, Baojing Gu, Yi Li, Xiuying Zhang, Jianlin Shen, Li Lu, Xiaosheng Luo, Yu Zhao, Zhaozhong Feng, Jeffrey L. Collett Jr., Fusuo Zhang, and Xuejun Liu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 10931–10954, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-10931-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-10931-2018, 2018
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Our main results demonstrate that atmospheric Nr pollution in eastern China is more serious in the northern region than in the southern region. Any effects of current emission controls are not yet apparent in Nr pollution. NH3 emissions from fertilizer use were the largest contributor (36 %) to total inorganic Nr deposition. Our results provide useful information for policy-makers that mitigation of NH3 emissions should be a priority to tackle serious N deposition.
Xavier Querol, Andrés Alastuey, Gotzon Gangoiti, Noemí Perez, Hong K. Lee, Heeram R. Eun, Yonghee Park, Enrique Mantilla, Miguel Escudero, Gloria Titos, Lucio Alonso, Brice Temime-Roussel, Nicolas Marchand, Juan R. Moreta, M. Arantxa Revuelta, Pedro Salvador, Begoña Artíñano, Saúl García dos Santos, Mónica Anguas, Alberto Notario, Alfonso Saiz-Lopez, Roy M. Harrison, Millán Millán, and Kang-Ho Ahn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 6511–6533, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-6511-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-6511-2018, 2018
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We show the main drivers of high O3 episodes in and around Madrid. High levels of ultrafine particles (UFPs) are evidenced, but we demonstrate that most O3 arises from the fumigation of high atmospheric layers, whereas UFPs are generated inside the PBL. O3 contributions from the fumigation of the vertical recirculation of regional air masses, hemispheric transport, and horizontally from direct urban plume transport are shown. Complexity arises from the need to quantify them to abate surface O3.
Qianqian Hong, Cheng Liu, Ka Lok Chan, Qihou Hu, Zhouqing Xie, Haoran Liu, Fuqi Si, and Jianguo Liu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 5931–5951, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-5931-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-5931-2018, 2018
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We presented ship-based MAX-DOAS measurements of tropospheric trace gases' distribution along the eastern part of the Yangtze River during winter 2015. Tropospheric VCDs of NO2, SO2, and HCHO were retrieved from MAX-DOAS measurement spectra. Enhanced tropospheric NO2 and SO2 VCDs were detected over downwind areas of industrial zones over the Yangtze River. Our results indicate that different pollution control strategies should be applied in different provinces.
Murray J. Smith, Carolyn F. Walker, Thomas G. Bell, Mike J. Harvey, Eric S. Saltzman, and Cliff S. Law
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 5861–5877, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-5861-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-5861-2018, 2018
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The transfer of gases across the air–sea interface has a significant influence on climate. During a research voyage in the South Pacific we measured the transfer rate of the biogenic gas dimethyl sulfide (DMS) from the ocean using two independent methods. The agreement between the techniques provides confidence in their use in compilations of global gas transfer. We also identified physical conditions under which the observations are not well predicted by a standard gas transfer model.
Geoffrey C. Toon, Jean-Francois L. Blavier, and Keeyoon Sung
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 5075–5088, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-5075-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-5075-2018, 2018
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Remote sensing measurements of ethene have been made from the ground and from balloons. Ethene can be measured at low altitudes in polluted regions, such as the Los Angeles basin. Here ethene amounts have decreased by a factor of 3 over the past 25 years due to increasingly strict emission control regulations (e.g., on vehicle exhaust).
Hao Wang, Xiaopu Lyu, Hai Guo, Yu Wang, Shichun Zou, Zhenhao Ling, Xinming Wang, Fei Jiang, Yangzong Zeren, Wenzhuo Pan, Xiaobo Huang, and Jin Shen
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 4277–4295, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4277-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4277-2018, 2018
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While oceanic air is generally thought to be clean, the air pollution over waters in proximity to the coasts is not well recognized. This research indicated that ozone was higher over South China Sea (SCS) than that in the adjacent continental area, while continental anticyclone, tropical cyclone and land breeze favored O3 formation over SCS. In addition, weaker NO titration and stronger atmospheric oxidative capacity led to higher O3 production efficiency over SCS.
Fabian Schoenenberger, Stephan Henne, Matthias Hill, Martin K. Vollmer, Giorgos Kouvarakis, Nikolaos Mihalopoulos, Simon O'Doherty, Michela Maione, Lukas Emmenegger, Thomas Peter, and Stefan Reimann
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 4069–4092, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4069-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4069-2018, 2018
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Anthropogenic halocarbon emissions contribute to stratospheric ozone depletion and global warming. We measured atmospheric halocarbons for 6 months on Crete to extend the coverage of the existing observation network to the Eastern Mediterranean. The derived emission estimates showed a contribution of 16.8 % (13.6–23.3 %) and 53.2 % (38.1–84.2 %) of this region to the total HFC and HCFC emissions of the analyzed European domain and a reduction of the underlying uncertainties by 40–80 %.
Irène Xueref-Remy, Elsa Dieudonné, Cyrille Vuillemin, Morgan Lopez, Christine Lac, Martina Schmidt, Marc Delmotte, Frédéric Chevallier, François Ravetta, Olivier Perrussel, Philippe Ciais, François-Marie Bréon, Grégoire Broquet, Michel Ramonet, T. Gerard Spain, and Christophe Ampe
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 3335–3362, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-3335-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-3335-2018, 2018
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Urbanized and industrialized areas are the largest source of fossil CO2. This work analyses the atmospheric CO2 variability observed from the first in situ network deployed in the Paris megacity area. Gradients of several ppm are found between the rural, peri-urban and urban sites at the diurnal to the seasonal scales. Wind direction and speed as well as boundary layer dynamics, correlated to highly variable urban emissions, are shown to be key regulator factors of the observed CO2 records.
Geoffrey C. Toon, Jean-Francois L. Blavier, and Keeyoon Sung
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 1923–1944, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1923-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1923-2018, 2018
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OCS is the main form of atmospheric sulfur. It is produced near the earth's surface and destroyed primarily in the stratosphere, where it is converted to stratospheric sulfate aerosol (SSA). SSA plays an important role in atmospheric chemistry and transport and so it is important to better understand the factors that regulate OCS and hence SSA. Ground-based and balloon-borne infrared spectra observed over the past 30 years are analyzed to provide an improved OCS dataset.
Simon Schallhart, Pekka Rantala, Maija K. Kajos, Juho Aalto, Ivan Mammarella, Taina M. Ruuskanen, and Markku Kulmala
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 815–832, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-815-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-815-2018, 2018
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Emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) have impact to air quality, human health and climate. We investigated the development of VOC exchange in a boreal forest between April and June 2013. VOC exchange and diversity increased towards summer, but over 75 % of the biogenic net exchange was driven by methanol, monoterpenes and acetone only. The boreal forest emitted less than 0.2 % carbon in form of VOCs in relation to the carbon uptake.
Wanyun Xu, Xiaobin Xu, Meiyun Lin, Weili Lin, David Tarasick, Jie Tang, Jianzhong Ma, and Xiangdong Zheng
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 773–798, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-773-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-773-2018, 2018
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The impact of anthropogenic emissions and climate variability on the long-term trends and periodicity of surface ozone measured at Mt Waliguan (WLG) for the period of 1994–2013 is studied. STT ozone and rising emissions in eastern China contribute to spring and autumnal increasing trends, respectively. The 2–3-, 3–7-, and 11-year periodicities in the ozone data are linked to the QBO, EASMI, and sunspot cycle, respectively. An empirical model is obtained for normalised monthly ozone at WLG.
Qian Yu, Yao Luo, Shuxiao Wang, Zhiqi Wang, Jiming Hao, and Lei Duan
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 495–509, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-495-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-495-2018, 2018
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This study provides high-quality direct observation data of a clean and a contaminated site in subtropical south China and quantifies the natural forest Hg emission. We find that clean and contaminated forests present a net GEM source with annual average values of 6.67 and 0.30 ng m-2 h-1, respectively; daily variations of GEM fluxes showed a source in the daytime with a peak at 13:00, and as a sink or balance at night; and higher atmospheric GEM concentration restricted the forest GEM emission.
Xuemeng Chen, Lauriane L. J. Quéléver, Pak L. Fung, Jutta Kesti, Matti P. Rissanen, Jaana Bäck, Petri Keronen, Heikki Junninen, Tuukka Petäjä, Veli-Matti Kerminen, and Markku Kulmala
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 49–63, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-49-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-49-2018, 2018
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We analysed a 20-year-long dataset collected in a Finnish boreal forest at SMEAR II station to investigate the frequency and strength of ozone depletion events. We could identify a number of ozone depletion events that lasted for more than 3 h, mainly in the autumn and winter months. Their occurrence was likely related to the formation of a low mixing layer under the conditions of low temperatures, low wind speeds, high relative humidities and limited intensity of solar radiation.
Emmaline Atherton, David Risk, Chelsea Fougère, Martin Lavoie, Alex Marshall, John Werring, James P. Williams, and Christina Minions
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 12405–12420, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-12405-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-12405-2017, 2017
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Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, and leaks from natural gas infrastructure are thought to be a significant emission source. We used a mobile survey method to measure GHGs near Canadian infrastructure. Our results show that ~ 47 % of active wells were emitting. Abandoned and aging wells were also associated with emissions. We estimate methane emissions from this development are just over 111 Mt year−1, which is more than previous government estimates, but less than similar studies in the US.
Huiting Mao, Dolly Hall, Zhuyun Ye, Ying Zhou, Dirk Felton, and Leiming Zhang
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 11655–11671, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-11655-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-11655-2017, 2017
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Mercury (Hg) is a global pollutant hazardous to human and ecosystem health, and its emission control is imperative. Anthropogenic mercury emissions have been reduced by 78 % in the United States from 1990 to 2014. However, no clearly defined trend was observed in Hg concentrations at urban locations such as the one in this study. This indicates that other factors may have dominated over anthropogenic emission control. The implications of this study could hence be highly policy relevant.
Xiufeng Yin, Shichang Kang, Benjamin de Foy, Zhiyuan Cong, Jiali Luo, Lang Zhang, Yaoming Ma, Guoshuai Zhang, Dipesh Rupakheti, and Qianggong Zhang
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 11293–11311, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-11293-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-11293-2017, 2017
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We presented 5-year surface ozone measurements at Nam Co in the inland Tibetan Plateau and made a synthesis comparison of diurnal and seasonal patterns on regional and hemispheric scales. Surface ozone at Nam Co is mainly dominated by natural processes and is less influenced by stratospheric intrusions and human activities than on the rim of the Tibetan Plateau. Ozone at Nam Co is representative of background that is valuable for studying ozone-related effects on large scales.
Bo Christiansen, Nis Jepsen, Rigel Kivi, Georg Hansen, Niels Larsen, and Ulrik Smith Korsholm
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 9347–9364, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-9347-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-9347-2017, 2017
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Ozone soundings in the troposphere from nine Arctic stations covering the period 1984–2014 have been analyzed. Stations with the best data coverage show a consistent and significant temporal variation with a maximum near 2005 followed by a decrease. Some significant changes are found in the annual cycle in agreement with the notion that the ozone summer maximum is appearing earlier in the year. Such changes in Arctic ozone in the free troposphere have not been reported before.
Thomas G. Bell, Sebastian Landwehr, Scott D. Miller, Warren J. de Bruyn, Adrian H. Callaghan, Brian Scanlon, Brian Ward, Mingxi Yang, and Eric S. Saltzman
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 9019–9033, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-9019-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-9019-2017, 2017
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The mechanisms that determine the air–sea exchange of gases such as carbon dioxide are not well understood. During a research cruise in the North Atlantic, we simultaneously measured the air–sea transfer of two gases with contrasting solubility over a range in wind and wave conditions. We compare the transfer of these gases to improve understanding of how bubbles from breaking waves may mediate air–sea gas fluxes.
Stuart N. Riddick, Sarah Connors, Andrew D. Robinson, Alistair J. Manning, Pippa S. D. Jones, David Lowry, Euan Nisbet, Robert L. Skelton, Grant Allen, Joseph Pitt, and Neil R. P. Harris
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 17, 7839–7851, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-7839-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-17-7839-2017, 2017
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High methane mixing ratios occurred at our long-term measurement site. Isotopic measurements show the source is a landfill 7 km away; the emissions were estimated using three different approaches. The emission estimates made by near-source and middle-distance methods agree well for a period of intense observation. The estimate of the inverse modelling is similar to the labour-intensive middle-distance approach, which shows it can be used to identify point sources within an emission landscape.
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Short summary
Sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) is a potent greenhouse gas which is regulated under the Kyoto Protocol. From a 40-year record of measurements, collected at five global monitoring sites and archived air samples, we show that its concentration in the atmosphere has steadily increased. Using modelling techniques, we estimate that global emissions have increased by about 24 % over the past decade. We find that this increase is driven by the demand for SF6-insulated switchgear in developing countries.
Sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) is a potent greenhouse gas which is regulated under the Kyoto...
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