Odds and ends of atmospheric mercury in Europe and over the North Atlantic Ocean: temporal trends of 25 years of measurements
The global monitoring plan of the Minamata Convention on Mercury was established to generate long-term data necessary for evaluating the effectiveness of regulatory measures at a global scale. After 25 years of monitoring (since 1995), Mace Head is one of the atmospheric monitoring stations with the...
| Published in: | Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , |
| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2022
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-3827-2022 https://doaj.org/article/594b8e6a31074aada1d971e847281b77 |
| Summary: | The global monitoring plan of the Minamata Convention on Mercury was established to generate long-term data necessary for evaluating the effectiveness of regulatory measures at a global scale. After 25 years of monitoring (since 1995), Mace Head is one of the atmospheric monitoring stations with the longest mercury record and has produced sufficient data for the analysis of temporal trends of total gaseous mercury (TGM) in Europe and the North Atlantic. Using concentration-weighted trajectories for atmospheric mercury measured at Mace Head as well as another five locations in Europe, Amderma, Andøya, Villum, Waldhof and Zeppelin, we identify the regional probabilistic source contribution factor and its changes for the period of 1996 to 2019. Temporal trends indicate that concentrations of mercury in the atmosphere in Europe and the North Atlantic have declined significantly over the past 25 years at a non-monotonic rate averaging 0.03 <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M1" display="inline" overflow="scroll" dspmath="mathml"><mrow class="unit"><mi mathvariant="normal">ng</mi><mspace width="0.125em" linebreak="nobreak"/><msup><mi mathvariant="normal">m</mi><mrow><mo>-</mo><mn mathvariant="normal">3</mn></mrow></msup><mspace linebreak="nobreak" width="0.125em"/><msup><mi mathvariant="normal">yr</mi><mrow><mo>-</mo><mn mathvariant="normal">1</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math> <svg:svg xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="56pt" height="15pt" class="svg-formula" dspmath="mathimg" md5hash="e0df9e597572b9a5f6a2069b40350b1f"><svg:image xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xlink:href="acp-22-3827-2022-ie00001.svg" width="56pt" height="15pt" src="acp-22-3827-2022-ie00001.png"/></svg:svg> . Concentrations of TGM at remote marine sites were shown to be affected by continental long-range transport, and evaluation ... |
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