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Symposium on Climate, Forest Growth, Fire and Air Quality Interactions

Symposium on Climate, Forest Growth, Fire and Air Quality Interactions Overview of Project and Personnel. Uma Shankar Carolina Environmental Program The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill September 7, 2006. Acknowledgments. Project funding: EPA STAR Grant RD 83227701

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Symposium on Climate, Forest Growth, Fire and Air Quality Interactions

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  1. Symposium on Climate, Forest Growth,Fire and Air Quality Interactions Overview of Project and Personnel Uma Shankar Carolina Environmental Program The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill September 7, 2006

  2. Acknowledgments • Project funding: EPA STAR Grant RD 83227701 • Dr. Darrell Winner, Program Officer • Aim is to support the EPA Global Change Program by • Examining consequences of climate change for wild fire occurrence and consequently for U.S. air quality • Combining the effects of climate change with forest growth to examine impacts on fire frequency and intensity • Investigating methods to credibly project changes in biogenic emissions from 2002-2050 due to fires

  3. Thank You • Participation and Outreach: USDA Forest Service • Donald McKenzie, Pacific Wildland Fire Sciences Lab • Jeffrey Prestemon and Evan Mercer, Southern Research Station • Steven McNulty and Jennifer Moore Myers, Southern Global Change Program for tirelessly fielding questions • Facility Arrangements: Tony Reevy, Associate Director, CEP • Logistical Support: Shelia Nickerson, Admin Assistant, Center for Environmental Modeling for Policy Development

  4. Air Quality and Climate Impactsof Fires • Impacts of wild fires felt at the regional and global scale • > 8M acres burned last year • Black carbon => positive forcing on climate; SO2 emissions => negative forcing on climate from secondarily produced SO4 • Dioxins and GHGsalso associated with fire plumes (Gullett and Tuotti, AE 37, 2003; Simmonds et al., AE 39, 2005) • Effect of radiatively important pollutants on short-term climate variability affects forest growth, and thus the biogenic emissions as well as fuel available for potential fires CO O3 CarbonaceousPM Model predictions of the effects of Canadian boreal fires on PM and ozone in July 1995

  5. Modeling Issues • Feedback of short-term climate variability to forest growth is not represented in most models • Most atmospheric chemistry-transport models do not include feedback to dynamics of scattering and absorbing aerosols or ozone • Understanding these feedbacks is essential to fully assessing the impact of managed vs. uncontrolled fires on forest land and the net benefits of fire management plans

  6. Objectives • Examine impacts of short-term climate variability on: • forest growth -> fuel loads -> fire frequency, fire emissions • feedbacks to forest biomass and biogenic emissions • To investigate the changes in air quality due to evolution of emissions in response to fires in successive years under various fire scenarios • To study the feedbacks of these air quality changes to climate variability • In the process, to build a modeling system that can be further refined for similar assessments

  7. Modeling System Monthly met. PnET CCSM Initial & boundary met. Base & future year fuel data Fire Simulator Hourly met METCHEM (MM5-MCPL / MAQSIP) Fire activity data Anthropogenic inventoried emissions Modified biogenic land use data BlueSky-EM- SMOKE- BEIS3 Gridded & Speciated Emissions

  8. Forest Growth Modeling • Forest process model used by the US Forest Service’s Southern Global Change Program • Limei Ran (CEP) – GIS and FIA database experience • Consultants: Steven G. McNulty and Jennifer Moore Myers, Southern Global Change Program, USDA Forest Service

  9. Fire/Smoke Emissions Modeling • BlueSky-EM, which links a smoke emissions model with the Sparse Matrix Operator Kernel Emissions Model for processing and merging with emissions from other sources • Andy Holland(CEP) – extensive experience with SMOKE application and development • Consultant: Doug Fox (co-PI), CIRA • Future-year fire modeling expertise from USDA FS consultants • Donald McKenzie, Pacific Wildland Fire Sciences Lab, USDA Forest Service on fuel load databaseand futureyear fires • Jeff Prestemon and Evan Mercer, Southern Research Station, USDA Forest Service on Southern U.S. fire triggers

  10. Air Quality and Climate Feedback Modeling • Coupled meteorology-chemistry model developed by CEP (Aijun Xiu, PI) under a previous EPA grant • Ongoing development and applications over the U.S. and South Asia • Aijun Xiu: meteorology/climate modeling • Uma Shankar, Frank Binkowski: aerosol and radiative transfer modeling and analysis • Sarav Arunachalam: gas-phase chemistry modeling and analysis • Adel Hanna: climate dynamics and analysis

  11. Documentation Support / Coordination • Jeanne Eichinger (CEP) – Technical Editor

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