Tzung-May Fu

Quantifying the seasonal and interannual variability of North American isoprene emissions using satellite observations of the formaldehyde column

JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 111, D12315, doi:10.1029/2005JD006689, 2006 Quantifying the seasonal and interannual variability of North American isoprene emissions using satellite observations of the formaldehyde column Paul I. Palmer, 1,2 Dorian S. Abbot, 1 Tzung-May Fu, 1 Daniel J. Jacob, 1 Kelly Chance, 3 Thomas P. Kurosu, 3 Alex Guenther, 4 Christine Wiedinmyer, 4 Jenny C. Stanton, 5 Michael J. Pilling, 5 Shelley N. Pressley, 6 Brian Lamb, 6 and Anne Louise Sumner 7 Received 20 September 2005; revised 19 December 2005; accepted 14 February 2006; published 27 June 2006. [ 1 ] Quantifying isoprene emissions using satellite observations of the formaldehyde (HCHO) columns is subject to errors involving the column retrieval and the assumed relationship between HCHO columns and isoprene emissions, taken here from the GEOS- CHEM chemical transport model. Here we use a 6-year (1996–2001) HCHO column data set from the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME) satellite instrument to (1) quantify these errors, (2) evaluate GOME-derived isoprene emissions with in situ flux measurements and a process-based emission inventory (Model of Emissions of Gases and Aerosols from Nature, MEGAN), and (3) investigate the factors driving the seasonal and interannual variability of North American isoprene emissions. The error in the GOME HCHO column retrieval is estimated to be 40%. We use the Master Chemical Mechanism (MCM) to quantify the time-dependent HCHO production from isoprene, a- and b-pinenes, and methylbutenol and show that only emissions of isoprene are detectable by GOME. The time-dependent HCHO yield from isoprene oxidation calculated by MCM is 20–30% larger than in GEOS-CHEM. GOME-derived isoprene fluxes track the observed seasonal variation of in situ measurements at a Michigan forest site with a 30% bias. The seasonal variation of North American isoprene emissions during 2001 inferred from GOME is similar to MEGAN, with GOME emissions typically 25% higher (lower) at the beginning (end) of the growing season. GOME and MEGAN both show a maximum over the southeastern United States, but they differ in the precise location. The observed interannual variability of this maximum is 20–30%, depending on month. The MEGAN isoprene emission dependence on surface air temperature explains 75% of the month-to-month variability in GOME-derived isoprene emissions over the southeastern United States during May–September 1996–2001. Citation: Palmer, P. I., et al. (2006), Quantifying the seasonal and interannual variability of North American isoprene emissions using satellite observations of the formaldehyde column, J. Geophys. Res., 111, D12315, doi:10.1029/2005JD006689. 1. Introduction [ 2 ] Emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from the terrestrial biosphere have important implications Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. Now at the School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Massachu- setts, USA. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado, USA. Department of Chemistry, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington, USA. Battelle, Columbus, Ohio, USA. Copyright 2006 by the American Geophysical Union. 0148-0227/06/2005JD006689 for tropospheric ozone (O 3 ) [Wang and Shallcross, 2000], organic aerosols [Claeys et al., 2004], and climate change [Sanderson et al., 2003]. Local VOC emission data, representative of scales less than 1 km, are difficult to extrapolate, and consequently the magnitude and variabil- ity of these emissions is not well understood on conti- nental scales. Standard emission inventories based on ecosystem data and emission factors [Guenther et al., 2005] are poorly constrained. We have shown previously that observations of formaldehyde (HCHO) columns from the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME) satel- lite instrument [Chance et al., 2000] provide information to estimate biogenic VOC emissions, specifically isoprene emissions, on a global scale and with resolution of the order of 100 km [Palmer et al., 2003]. We examine here the quantitative value of these data for better understand- D12315 1 of 14

Spatial distribution of isoprene emissions from North America derived from formaldehyde column measurements by the OMI satellite sensor

Received 10 May 2007; revised 19 September 2007; accepted 25 October 2007; published 26 January 2008. [1] Space-borne formaldehyde (HCHO) column measurements from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI), with 13 � 24 km 2 nadir footprint and daily global coverage, provide new constraints on the spatial distribution of biogenic isoprene emission from North America. OMI HCHO columns for June-August 2006 are consistent with measurements from the earlier GOME satellite sensor (1996–2001) but OMI is 2–14% lower. The spatial distribution of OMI HCHO columns follows that of isoprene emission; anthropogenic hydrocarbon emissions are undetectable except in Houston. We develop updated relationships between HCHO columns and isoprene emission from a chemical transport model (GEOS-Chem), and use these to infer top-down constraints on isoprene emissions from the OMI data. We compare the OMI-derived emissions to a state-of-science bottom-up isoprene emission inventory (MEGAN) driven by two land cover databases, and use the results to optimize the MEGAN emission factors (EFs) for broadleaf trees (the main isoprene source). The OMI-derived isoprene emissions in North America (June–August 2006) with 1 � 1 resolution are spatially consistent with MEGAN (R 2 = 0.48–0.68) but are lower (by 4–25% on average). MEGAN overestimates emissions in the Ozarks and the Upper South. A better fit to OMI (R 2 = 0.73) is obtained in MEGAN by using a uniform isoprene EF from broadleaf trees rather than variable EFs. Thus MEGAN may overestimate emissions in areas where it specifies particularly high EFs. Within-canopy isoprene oxidation may also lead to significant differences between the effective isoprene emission to the atmosphere seen by OMI and the actual isoprene emission determined by MEGAN.

Source attribution of particulate matter pollution over North China with the adjoint method

We quantify the source contributions to surface PM2.5 (fine particulate matter) pollution over North China from January 2013 to 2015 using the GEOS-Chem chemical transport model and its adjoint with improved model horizontal resolution (1/4° × 5/16°) and aqueous-phase chemistry for sulfate production. The adjoint method attributes the PM2.5 pollution to emissions from different source sectors and chemical species at the model resolution. Wintertime surface PM2.5 over Beijing is contributed by emissions of organic carbon (27% of the total source contribution), anthropogenic fine dust (27%), and SO2 (14%), which are mainly from residential and industrial sources, followed by NH3 (13%) primarily from agricultural activities. About half of the Beijing pollution originates from sources outside of the city municipality. Adjoint analyses for other cities in North China all show significant regional pollution transport, supporting a joint regional control policy for effectively mitigating the PM2.5 air pollution.

Adjoint inversion of Chinese non-methane volatile organic compound emissions using space-based observations of formaldehyde and glyoxal

We used the GEOS-Chem model and its adjoint to quantify Chinese non-methane volatile organic compound (NMVOC) emissions for the year 2007, using the tropospheric column concentrations of formaldehyde and glyoxal observed by the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment 2A (GOME-2A) instrument and the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) as quantitative constraints. We conducted a series of inversion experiments using different combinations of satellite observations to explore their impacts on the topdown emission estimates. Our top-down estimates for Chinese annual total NMVOC emissions were 30.7 to 49.5 (average 41.9) Tg yr−1, including 16.4 to 23.6 (average 20.2) Tg yr−1 from anthropogenic sources, 12.2 to 22.8 (average 19.2) Tg yr−1 from biogenic sources, and 2.08 to 3.13 (average 2.48) Tg yr−1 from biomass burning. In comparison, the a priori estimate for Chinese annual total NMVOC emissions was 38.3 Tg yr−1, including 18.8 Tg yr−1 from anthropogenic sources, 17.3 Tg yr−1 from biogenic sources, and 2.27 Tg yr−1 from biomass burning. The simultaneous use of glyoxal and formaldehyde observations helped distinguish the NMVOC species from different sources and was essential in constraining anthropogenic emissions. Our four inversion experiments consistently showed that the Chinese anthropogenic emissions of NMVOC precursors of glyoxal were larger than the a priori estimates. Our top-down estimates for Chinese annual emission of anthropogenic aromatics (benzene, toluene, and xylene) ranged from 5.5 to 7.9 Tg yr−1, 2 % to 46 % larger than the estimate of the a priori emission inventory (5.4 Tg yr−1). Three out of our four inversion experiments indicated that the seasonal variation in Chinese NMVOC emissions was significantly stronger than indicated in the a priori inventory. Model simulations driven by the average of our top-down NMVOC emission estimates (which had a stronger seasonal variation than the a priori) showed that surface afternoon ozone concentrations over eastern China increased by 1–8 ppb in June and decreased by 1–10 ppb in December relative to the simulations using the a priori emissions and were in better agreement with measurements. We concluded that the satellite observations of formaldehyde and glyoxal together provided quantitative constraints on the emissions and source types of NMVOCs over China and improved our understanding on regional chemistry. Published by Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union. 15018 H. Cao et al.: Adjoint inversion of Chinese non-methane volatile organic