Source Identification and Airborne Chemical Characterisation of Aerosol Pollution from Long-range Transport over Greenland during POLARCAT Summer campaign 2008

• Main Authors: Schmale, J., Schneider, J., Ancellet, Gérard, Quennehen, Boris, Stohl, A., Sodemann, H., Arnold, S.R., Borrmann, S., Law, Kathy S.
• Other Authors: Max-Planck-Institut für Chemie (MPIC), Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, TROPO - LATMOS, Laboratoire Atmosphères, Milieux, Observations Spatiales (LATMOS), Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Laboratoire de météorologie physique (LaMP), Université Blaise Pascal - Clermont-Ferrand 2 (UBP)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU), Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science Zürich (IAC), Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule - Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zürich (ETH Zürich), Institute for Climate and Atmospheric Science Leeds (ICAS), School of Earth and Environment Leeds (SEE), University of Leeds-University of Leeds, Institute for Atmospheric Physics Mainz (IPA), Johannes Gutenberg - Universität Mainz = Johannes Gutenberg University (JGU)
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2012
• Subjects: [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-AO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics [physics.ao-ph]; [SDE]Environmental Sciences; Canada; Greenland; Kangerlussuaq; Ice Sheet; IPY; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://insu.hal.science/insu-01184583

International audience We present results from the deployment of a unit mass resolution Aerodyne aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) during the IPY POLARCAT-France (Polar Study using Aircraft, Remote Sensing, Surface Measurements and Models, of Climate, Chemistry, Aerosols, and Transport) campaign. Free tropospheric measurements were taken from aboard the French research aircraft ATR-42 which operated out of Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, between 30 June and 14 July 2008. The primary purpose of the AMS deployment in this field campaign was to chemically characterise high latitude tropospheric background as well as long-range transport aerosol from biomass burning (BB) and anthropogenic activities, i.e. fossil fuel combustion (FF), originating from North America, Eurasia and East Asia.Online size resolved chemical composition data of non-refractory submicron aerosol were collected up to 7.6 km altitude in the region 60 to 71°N and 40 to 60°W over the North Atlantic and the Greenland ice sheet. Altogether, 48 BB and FF plumes were sampled. Transport pathways of detected events included advection below 700 hPa, air mass uplifting in warm conveyor belts, and high altitude transport in the upper troposphere. By means of the Lagrangian particle dispersion model FLEXPART, trace gas analysis of O3 and CO, particle size distributions and aerosol chemical composition the pollution events were identified and classified into five chemically distinct categories. Aerosol from North American BB with almost no anthropogenic emission influence consisted of 22 % particulate sulphate, while with increasing FF and Asian contributions the fraction of particulate sulphate increased. Aerosol from Asian FF dominated plumes was composed of up to 37 % sulphate on average. Overall, it was found that the organic matter fraction was larger (85 %) in pollution plumes than for background conditions (71 %). Despite different source regions and emission types the particle oxygen to carbon ratio of all plume classes was around 1 indicating ...