Modelling atmospheric transport of persistent organic pollutants in the Northern Hemisphere with a 3-D dynamical model: DEHM-POP

• Main Authors: Hansen, K. M., Christensen, J. H., Brandt, J., Frohn, L. M., Geels, C.
• Other Authors: Department of Atmospheric Environment Roskilde (ATMI), National Environmental Research Institute Danmark (NERI)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2004
• Subjects: [SDU.OCEAN]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Ocean; Atmosphere; Arctic
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-00301139; https://hal.science/hal-00301139/document; https://hal.science/hal-00301139/file/acpd-4-1339-2004.pdf

International audience The Danish Eulerian Hemispheric Model (DEHM) is a 3-D dynamical atmospheric transport model originally developed to describe the atmospheric transport of sulphur into the Arctic. A new version of the model, DEHM-POP, developed to study the atmospheric transport and environmental fate of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) is presented. During environmental cycling, POPs can be deposited and re-emitted several times before reaching a final destination. A description of the exchange processes between the land/ocean surfaces and the atmosphere is included in the model to account for this multi-hop transport. The ?-isomer of the pesticide hexachlorocyclohexane (?-HCH) is used as tracer in the model development. The structure of the model and processes included are described in detail. The results from a model simulation showing the atmospheric transport for the years 1991 to 1998 are presented and evaluated against measurements. The annual averaged atmospheric concentration of ?-HCH for the 1990s is well described by the model; however, the shorter-term average concentration for most of the stations is not well captured. This indicates that the present simple surface description needs to be refined to get a better description of the air-surface exchange proceses of POPs.