Description
The climate impact of absorbing aerosols, such as black carbon particles originating from fossil fuel combustion or biomass burning, mineral dust and volcanic ash, is still very poorly understood especially its role in the atmosphere of polar regions. The main objective of this project is to use experimental and theoretical research techniques to quantify the impact of the absorbing aerosols on radiative forcing in the European Arctic by carrying out studies of various physical processes involving strongly absorbing aerosols. The proposed research is designed to improve our knowledge of physical processes that control the formation and transformation of atmospheric absorbing aerosols and the feedback mechanism between the climate change and the radiative equilibrium. The project will contribute to the scientific knowledge in three primary areas: instrumentation and technique development, deployment and testing of the state-of-the-art instrumentation, and development …
Summary of project results
The climate impact of absorbing particles is still very poorly understood especially its role in the atmosphere of polar regions. It is mainly due to two reasons: there are too few observations and too simplified description of physical processes used for climate and aerosol modeling. Therefore iAREA project was fused on the experiment and numerical study of the black carbon vertical profiles over Svalbard. We have proposed a new methodology to estimate the vertical profiles of aerosol single-scattering properties which utilizes the lidar, sun photometer and in-situ observations onboard tethered balloon. Our method, allows to retrieved profiles of single scattering albedo with acceptable uncertainty. In addition, we developed two instruments to measure aerosol optical properties in the Arctic conditions to describe the level of absorbing particles. Numerical simulation of absorbing particles from ship traffic is small in this region, assuming current anthropogenic emission level over land and the intensity of shipping (1.5-2% for the annual average.). We found that smoke particles from boreal fires in Alaska, Canada and Siberia have a significant impact on radiation budget in Arctic. In 2015 intensive fire in Alaska led to aerosol optical depth of more than 1 at 500 nm over high latitudes of the northern hemisphere. During this event the surface radiative cooling was up to –150 W/m2 and a heating rate of up to 2.5 K/day at 3 km. Numerical simulation had shown that presence of absorbing aerosol leads to destabilization of the layer and development of unstable convective layer. The convectively unstable layer corresponds to the layer of reduced static stability present in the atmospheric sounding initializing the simulation. The mean impact of black carbon participles on Arctic direct radiative forcing was estimate at +0.2 W/m2 while total anthropogenic effect is about -0.12 W/m2. The deliverable from project includes also 5 peer-reviewed papers, and several under review process. The results were presented over 40 posters and oral presentations during international and national conferences. In addition, the project deliverables were presented during TV and radio interviews, seminars for non-specialists and students. During the field campaign in Svalbard we presents real-time data and explain Arctic research on Facebook .
Summary of bilateral results
The main achievements on a bilateral level was share of experience between project partners, results of field campaigns and results of numerical simulations. The collaboration between partners allowed to improved knowledge about absorbing particles on Arctic radiation budget and climate issue. However, during iAREA grant we established addition collaboration with institutions outside of the project consortium. For example with Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU), Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS), and a few Italian Institutions. Bilateral funds contributed to strengthened bilateral relations at the project through several actions. For example, thought conferences and workshop meetings as well as international publications.