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Causes of Haze Assessment

Causes of Haze Assessment. Presented at the RPO National Technical Workgroup Meeting November 5, 2003. Dave DuBois Desert Research Institute. Acknowledgements. Funding from WRAP and CENRAP WRAP Air Monitoring & Reporting Forum Chair Marc Pitchford DRI Faculty

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Causes of Haze Assessment

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  1. Causes of Haze Assessment Presented at the RPO National Technical Workgroup Meeting November 5, 2003 Dave DuBois Desert Research Institute

  2. Acknowledgements • Funding from WRAP and CENRAP • WRAP Air Monitoring & Reporting Forum Chair • Marc Pitchford • DRI Faculty • Mark Green, Principal Investigator • Jin Xu • Dan Freeman • Vic Etyemezian • DRI students and hourly employees • Aleksandra Nikolic • Karl Graham • Anthony Deleon • Eric Peters 1

  3. COHA Status Report • Review goals and objectives • COHA approach • Virtual report • Aerosol descriptions • Meteorological descriptions • Emissions descriptions • Trajectory analysis • Episode analysis 2

  4. Goals & Objectives • Assess causes of haze for all study sites • Systematic study of 128 Class I areas in WRAP and CENRAP, 8 tribal sites and 10 CENRAP protocol sites • Encourage broad-based stakeholder participation throughout the assessment process • Enhance the utility and accessibility of the results for: • SIP & TIP development, • Regional air quality model evaluation & interpretation, • Identification of monitoring gaps, • Improved methodology for setting natural haze levels, • Tracking effectiveness of emission control programs 3

  5. COHA Study Data • Began analysis of 1997 to 2002 IMPROVE and protocol database • Primarily using IMPROVE and protocol sites with full speciation data in the study region (118 sites by December 2002) • Using nationwide network of 158 sites (end of 2002) to establish continental and regional setting 4

  6. COHA Approach Determine causes of haze at WRAP and CENRAP Class I areas, tribal and selected CENRAP IMPROVE protocol sites 5

  7. COHA Approach • Systematic study—many sites, many questions to answer • Processing reports in batch mode to facilitate timely completion • Give each site individual attention once batch processing is completed 6

  8. COHA Approach • Virtual report—no paper report • A virtual report designed as a tool to: • guide us in the causes of haze • communicate results • help users to interpret causes of haze • Virtual report gives us the ability to mix text, graphics, animations and links to external web sites in addition to timely updates 7

  9. The Causes of Haze web site is online now in a DRAFT, password protected form: http://coha.dri.edu Username: dri-coha Password: hazeyweb Much of the web site is a shell ready to receive data and causes of haze information that we generate 8

  10. This interface is under construction and may change View reports by state, area, tribal area or protocol site View animations of IMPROVE measurements 9

  11. Aerosol Descriptive Analysis Provides answers to the questions: • For the years 1997-2001, how many measurements are available for the site in each month of each year, and what are the contributions of the major aerosol components to light extinction in each month of each year? • What is the overall average light extinction at the site, and what are the contributions of the major aerosol components to the light extinction? • What are the light extinction contributions by the major aerosol components for best, worst and average days and how do they compare? • What percentage of the sampling days are the worst days in each month & how variable are the chemical components? 10

  12. Aerosol Descriptive Analysis Aerosol descriptions available on web page now: BIBE1, Big Bend National Park, TX BOWA1, Boundary Waters Canoe Area, MN DENA1, Denali National Park, AK GRCA2 , Hance Camp at Grand Canyon NP, AZ HAVO1, Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, HI JARB1, Jarbidge Wilderness, NV MORA1, Mount Rainier National Park, WA SAGO1, San Gorgonio Wilderness, CA SAGU1, Saguaro National Monument, AZ UPBU1, Upper Buffalo Wilderness, AR 11

  13. Aerosol Descriptive Analysis Pages designed for users to copy and paste text and figures into their own reports Example: San Gorgonio Wilderness Area, California Both charts and text to describe the 20% best, worst and middle 60% Printer friendly and black & white versions of pages 12

  14. Meteorological & Emissions Descriptive Analysis • Archived monitoring network locations, climate, emissions, wildfires, census, political, physical, and image databases • Information from these databases are helping us build conceptual models and answer descriptive analysis questions by visualizing data (e.g. map emissions densities) • Assist us in the general and detailed description of the meteorological setting of each site • Over 120 GB of spatial data archived at DRI 13

  15. Descriptive Analysis Map Progress • Standard maps to support descriptive analysis text • Terrain (labels on rivers, lakes, major features, peaks) • Nearby met/air quality networks • Urban boundaries, roads, landmarks • Landuse map • Landsat image (qualitative landuse, with some features labeled) • Emissions map (fires, WRAP point inventory, urban areas, roads) • Specialized maps (as needed basis) • 3D terrain map • Meteorological flow map to illustrate transport 14

  16. Standard Analysis Map Progress 50 50 50 80 40 80 75 40 50 25 80 50 25 75 50 33 80 30 60 90 Maps for web site Approx. percent completed 60 80 Hawaii: 0, Alaska: 0 15

  17. Cucamonga Wilderness Area Example “20 km” terrain map 16

  18. Cucamonga Wilderness Area Example “2 km” terrain map 17

  19. Meteorological Description Update • Describe meteorological influences by defining regions: • Hawaii and So. Calif. Coastal are posted on web • Detailed meteorological descriptions: • San Gorgonio and Jarbidge are posted on web • Terrain description • Access database tool developed to assist descriptive text • Identify nearby meteorological measurements for use in interpreting aerosol data 18

  20. Cucamonga Wilderness Area Example “20 km” met/air quality network map 19

  21. Trajectory Analysis Status • Three years (2000-2001), three heights (10, 500, 1500m), every three hours • EDAS for continental sites and FNL for Hawaii and Alaska • HYSPLIT v4.6 model calculations done for all sites • Trajectory output being processed and stored in database • Trajectory tool being developed to produce ASCII summary files and convert trajectories into shapefiles • Generate summary maps 20

  22. Emissions Description Status • Developing standard template for web site • Creating maps of emissions surrounding each site at two scales: 2 km and 20 km • Include table of surrounding point sources ranked by distance and emission rate 21

  23. Cucamonga Wilderness Area “20 km” emissions map 22

  24. Episode Analysis • Use combination of backtrajectory, synoptic, mesoscale meteorological analysis, aerosol and emissions data to conceptually understand single site and regional or sub-regional episodes of high aerosol component concentrations • Systematic survey of episodes from the 1997 to 2002 IMPROVE database 23

  25. Episode Analysis • Created animated maps of IMPROVE and protocol measurements for entire network • Choose episodes base on sites classified with 20% worst light extinction • Noting duration, frequency, regional extent, season and components that contributed to light extinction • Assemble case studies and classify into episode types • Create database of these episodes • Combine results of episode analysis with cluster analysis to develop conceptual models 24

  26. “Hazagon” Analysis • The hazagon provides a way to visualize speciated extinction for those sites in the 20% worst category 25

  27. Wrap up • Phase I analyses completed by summer 2004 • Phase II analyses completed by 2005 • Possibilities of adding other RPO's • Continue to maintain and update the website information plus the need to repeat the assessment periodically (e.g. 5 year cycle). 26

  28. Example Episodes • April 16, 2001 Asian Dust over Western US • August 2001 wildfires • October 16, 2001 Arizona dust • September 3, 1997 Eastern sulfate transport to Colorado Plateau 27

  29. 4/16/01 Asian Dust Episode 28

  30. GOES View of the Dust Streak Across North America, April 17 GOES10 view of dust streak on the morning of April 17 GOES8 view of dust streak on the evening of April 17 29

  31. Transport of the Asian dust to the United States The common weather conditions are usually associated with the upper low pressure trough / cut-ff low and surface low pressure system (low formed by a strong cyclonic vortex) over northeast China and north Korea [Kim et al., 2002]. Under this weather conditions, Asian dust can move fast along the zonal wind distribution due to the jet streak [Kim et al., 2002]. 30

  32. Large Area Regional Haze on April 16, 2001 • 45 of the 68 WRAP IMPROVE monitoring sites were in 20% worst case days of the year 2001. For the sites that were 20% worst case days, the average contribution of fine soil to PM2.5 is ~60% (with a standard deviation of 13%), and dusts (fine soil and coarse mass) contributed in average ~ 46% (S.D. 13%) to the aerosol light extinction. • The average contribution of fine soil to PM2.5 is ~54%, and to aerosol light extinction is ~41% for all WRAP sites on April 16, 2001. 31

  33. Asian Dust Signature • Asian dust may cause haze in a large area and last several days depending on the regional and local weather conditions in the United States. • Usually, dust elements dominate the aerosol light extinction in the whole western United States during the Asian dust episode. The dust cloud may also move to the Eastern U.S. and influence some of the eastern sites, although the influence is usually much smaller in both spatial scale and loading. • Most of the Asian dust episodes happen in the spring during the Month of March to May. 32

  34. Asian Source Attribution Evidence • The desert regions in Mongolia and China, especially Gobi desert in Northwest China, are important sources of mineral aerosols. Given suitable weather conditions, dust can be lifted from the dry surface of the Asian Gobi desert region and transported to the United States in about 7-10 days. Extremely high aerosol loadings dominated by dust components are observed in Northern China and Korea during the episode. 33

  35. Origin of the Asian Dust Strong low pressure system sitting in northeast Mongolia caused surface wind speeds to be as high as ~30 m/s 34

  36. The August 2001 Western US Wildfire Episode Most of August experienced heavy OC in the west. 44 sites in the WRAP region experienced the worst 20% day on August 17. 3 sites had this day as worst Bext: CABI1, Cabinet Mountains, MT NOCA1, North Cascades, WA PASA1, Pasayten, WA 35

  37. The August 2001 Western US Wildfire Episode: August 11-23 Fires started early in August and lasted all month. 2001 was not a particularly bad fire year in terms of number of acres burned 36

  38. Databases available • IMPROVE data • Text, photos and maps on fires from NIFC, USFS, newspapers • Text on meteorology from NWS, NCDC • Weather maps from CDC, NCEP, WXP • MODIS satellite images from UWisc, USFS • Coarse fire locations fron MODIS, AVHRR 37

  39. Large Fire Locations Typical of late season fires, most of the fires are in the northwest and northern Great Basin 38

  40. August 15 Terra MODIS at 18:38 UTC shows transport of regional smoke plumes 39

  41. August 17 Terra MODIS at 18:38 UTCCan see thick smoke in NW and coastal areas The Moose Incident was one of the largest fires of the 2001 season. This lightning caused fire occurred August16th on the Flathead National Forest. The Moose fire ultimately burned approximately 71,000 acres before it was controlled. 40

  42. Conditions According to NIFC National Fire News the national level of preparedness increased to the highest point on the 16th, as more than one half million acres are burning in 42 large firesacross the United States. Nearly 21,000 firefighters are working on the fire lines. Record high temperatures in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho may increase large fire activity. Predicted strong winds will challenge firefighters on the 17th. Media reports on the 16th indicate federal troops will join the 21,000 firefighters. Fire activity as of mid-August was near to or slightly above the 10-year average. 41

  43. Drought http://lwf.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/2001/wildfire/08-07Statewideprank_pg.gif 42

  44. Morning surface weather 17 August (12:00 UTC) Notice radar echos (see end of presentation) 43

  45. Fires Fires 5 day backtrajectories from morning of 17 Aug Possible Canadian influence on Montana sites NM sites point toward regional fires in Northwest and upper Great Basin 44

  46. Arizona Local (Regional) Dust Episode 45

  47. Arizona Regional Dust Episode 46

  48. Surface Weather Map Before the Sampling Day 47

  49. Surface Weather Map Midnight October 16, 2001 48

  50. Annual Percentile of Bext, OC, FS and CM on 10/16/2001 49

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