José Antonio Adame

Surface ozone comparison conducted in two rural areas in central-southern Spain

PurposeThe purpose of this work is to contribute to the understanding of the photochemical air pollution analysing the levels and temporal variations of surface ozone in two rural areas situated in central-southern Spain.MethodThe study is based on ozone hourly data recorded during the overall period between January 2008 and November 2009. The seasonal and daily ozone cycles as well as the number of exceedances of the threshold established in the European Ozone Directive have been calculated and analysed.ResultsThis study presents the first ozone data registered at these two rural sites in the Iberian Peninsula plateau. Ozone shows a clear seasonal variation with the lowest values in January and November. High ozone concentrations are interrelated with high radiation intensities, temperature and wind directions. The information threshold defined in the European Ozone Directives was exceeded six times, while the limit for protection of human health was exceeded more than 40 times. The limits to protect the vegetation were also exceeded.ConclusionsPorzuna (near Cabañeros National Park) presents higher ozone levels than Argamasilla during the night-time and during the daytime of the summer months. Ozone levels are lower in Argamasilla probably due to fresh emissions from the close industrial area of Puertollano. The ozone exceedances of the limits defined in the Ozone Directive point out an ozone problem in this rural region.

A preliminary study on ambient levels of carbonyls, benzene, toluene and xylene in the south-west of the Iberian Peninsula (Huelva coast), Spain

We report the first observations of volatile organic compound (VOC) concentrations, including aldehydes, in the coastal, industrial area of Huelva near the Doñana National Park (south-west of the Iberian Peninsula). The periods studied were July–September 2008 and February–November 2009. Formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, acetone, propanal, benzene, toluene and m/p-xylenes were identified and quantified. Acetone and formaldehyde were the most abundant carbonyls, followed by acetaldehyde and propanal. Maximum and minimum values for all these compounds in the period of measurement, and their relationship with meteorological parameters or influence of anthropogenic or biogenic emissions, are analysed. Finally, different concentration ratios and correlations were calculated to assess the effect of the anthropogenic or biogenic processes on the observed VOC levels.

Evolution of NO2 levels in Spain from 1996 to 2012

We report on the evolution of tropospheric nitrogen dioxide (NO2) over Spain, focusing on the densely populated cities of Barcelona, Bilbao, Madrid, Sevilla and Valencia, during 17 years, from 1996 to 2012. This data series combines observations from in-situ air quality monitoring networks and the satellite-based instruments GOME and SCIAMACHY. The results in these five cities show a smooth decrease in the NO2 concentrations of ~2% per year in the period 1996–2008, due to the implementation of emissions control environmental legislation, and a more abrupt descend of ~7% per year from 2008 to 2012 as a consequence of the economic recession. In the whole Spanish territory the NO2 levels have decreased by ~22% from 1996 to 2012. Statistical analysis of several economic indicators is used to investigate the different factors driving the NO2 concentration trends over Spain during the last two decades.

Unexpected increase in the oxidation capacity of the urban atmosphere of Madrid, Spain

Atmospheric oxidants such as ozone (O3), hydroxyl and nitrate radicals (OH and NO3) determine the ability of the urban atmosphere to process organic and inorganic pollutants, which have an impact on air quality, environmental health and climate. Madrid city has experienced an increase of 30–40% in ambient air O3 levels, along with a decrease of 20–40% in NO2, from 2007 to 2014. Using air pollution observations and a high-resolution air quality model, we find a large concentration increase of up to 70% and 90% in OH and NO3, respectively, in downtown Madrid (domain-wide average increase of 10% and 32% for OH and NO3, respectively). The results also show an 11% reduction in the nitric acid concentrations, leading to a remarkable denoxification of this urban atmosphere with implications for lower PM2.5 levels and nitrogen input into ecosystems. This study suggests that projected worldwide NOx emission reductions, following air quality standards, will lead to important changes in the oxidizing capacity of the atmosphere in and around large cities.

Assessment on the Ozone Air Pollution in a Medium Metropolitan Area: Seville (Spain)

Problems caused by the air pollution which are generated mainly in metropolitan areas and industrial complexes, become in the major challenges for the current society. The air pollution has its origin in the chemical species emission into the atmosphere which may be harmful for human health (Lin, et al., 2008; Doherty et al., 2009), vegetation and ecosystems (Cape, 2008). The pollutants in the atmosphere can be classified in primary, directly emitted to the atmosphere, or secondary, formed in the atmosphere from chemical or photochemical reactions. Nowadays, the main air pollution problems are originated by secondary chemical species, as particles and surface ozone (Kumar et al., 2010; Lefohn et al., 2010). In Europe, there are several Directives to protect air quality, as the Directive 2008 which defines the new threshold for different pollutants. Generally, the highest concentrations of secondary species are registered in areas far away from the emissions sources, as suburban and rural areas. Nevertheless, there are urban areas that due to both meteorological and emissions conditions can suffer high levels of secondary substances (Papanastasiou and Melas, 2009; Alvim-Ferraz et al., 2006). In many countries there are air quality networks which measure concentrations both primary (NO, CO, SO2) and secondary pollutants and provide air quality information in real-time. However, in spite of the elevated economic cost of these networks, it is usual that the collected data are only used to determinate if a pollutant exceed the legal threshold according to the current Directive. Nevertheless, with the information obtained in the air quality networks is possible to carry out studies in order to improve the understanding of the atmospheric pollution and to help in the definition of plans and control strategies to the air quality. The work presented in this chapter is linked with a secondary pollutant, surface ozone, using data from an air quality network in a sensible region suitable to photochemical pollution problems. The study has been carried out in the Seville metropolitan area (low

Estimation of the atmospheric boundary layer height during different atmospheric conditions: a comparison on reliability of several methods applied to lidar measurements

ABSTRACT The performance of six numerical methods usually used to determine the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) height from lidar measurements was investigated under different atmospheric conditions: results were compared with those obtained from radiosoundings to analyse their reliability for ABL-height retrievals. The selected methods were the gradient method (GM), the logarithm gradient method (LGM), the inflection point method (IPM), the wavelet covariance transform (WCT), the centroid/variance method (VM), and the cluster analysis (CA). Lidar measurements were carried out in the frame of the ‘Atmospheric Minor Species relevant to the Ozone Chemistry’ (AMISOC) project during a multi-instrument campaign conducted at the INTA/Atmospheric Observatory ‘El Arenosillo’ (INTA/ARN) in south-western Spain from 15 May to 20 June 2012. The goal of this work is to analyse the performance and robustness of the different lidar methods in this region, characterized by particular atmospheric conditions. In particular, both events of sea–land breeze regimes and episodes of Saharan dust intrusions were studied. In most days, similar results were obtained by all lidar methods in the events of sea–land breeze regimes, presenting relative absolute differences between lidar and radiosounding retrievals below 12% in average. However, big discrepancies between lidar and radiosounding retrievals are found when residual layers are present in the measurements. In such cases, the vertical extension of lidar and radiosounding profiles must to be limited to the altitude of the residual layer bottom. In a second analysis, focused on diurnal variability in the ABL heights under non-dusty (ND) and dusty (DD) conditions, the methods were tested against intensive radiosoundings launched every 4 h over 2 days. Under ND conditions, the best results were achieved for the LGM, presenting a mean of the relative absolute differences respect to radiosounding measurements of 10%. The rest of methods also provided good results with relative differences below 20% in average. Under DD conditions, however, an increase of the relative differences is found with mean values of up 32%. In this case, best results are given by CA with a mean relative difference of 20%. Despite the limited data set used in this work, results show that unlike the ND conditions for which all lidar methods provide good results respect to radiosounding retrievals, under DD conditions the election of the lidar method is a key factor for ABL estimation. However, we remark the need of extending our analysis to longer periods of time to better characterize the differences observed in this work.

Multi-platform in-situ and remote sensing techniques to derive Saharan dust properties during AMISOC-TNF 2013

In the framework of AMISOC (Atmospheric Minor Species relevant to the Ozone Chemistry) project, a multiinstrumented campaign was performed in the Canary Islands area in summer-time from 01 July to 11 August 2013. Both ground-based remote-sensing and airborne in-situ measurements were performed under dust loading conditions. Saharan dusty (DD) conditions were reported during 57% of the overall campaign period. Particular DD cases corresponded to a 2-day period with a progressively arriving Saharan dust intrusion over Tenerife on 31 July (weak incidence) and 01 August (strong incidence). As reference, the non-dusty (ND) situation on 30 July was also examined. Vertical size distributions (SD) for particles within an extended fine-to-coarse (0.16-2.8 μm) mode were provided by using aircraft aerosol PCASP sonde measurements. Extinction profiles and Lidar ratio (LR) values were derived from Micro Pulse Lidar measurements. Despite no MAXDOAS aerosol profiling retrievals were available, the potential of this technique has also been introduced. A good agreement is found between the optical and microphysical properties, showing dust particles confined in a wide layer of around 4.5 km thickness from 1.5 to 6 km height. Dust incidence mostly affected the Free Troposphere (FT). LR ranged between 50 and 55 sr, showing typical values for Saharan dust particles. In general, the dust impact on mass concentration was enhanced due to the increase of larger particles, affecting both the Boundary layer (BL) and FT, but showing differences depending on the dusty case. MAXDOAS profiles are expected to be included in an extended version of this work.