Two-dimensional mineral dust radiative effect calculations from CALIPSO observations over Europe

• Published in: Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
• Main Authors: Granados-Muñoz, María José, Sicard, M., Papagiannopoulos, Nikolaos, Barragán, Rubén, Bravo Aranda, Juan Antonio, Nicolae, Doina
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: European Geosciences Union 2019
• Subjects: Cierva; Aerosol Robotic Network
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10481/57915; https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-13157-2019

A demonstration study to examine the feasibility of retrieving dust radiative effects based on combined satellite data from MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer), CERES (Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System) and CALIOP (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization) lidar vertical profiles along their orbit is presented. The GAME (Global Atmospheric Model) radiative transfer model is used to estimate the shortwave and longwave dust radiative effects below the CALIPSO (Cloud- Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite) orbit assuming an aerosol parameterization based on the CALIOP vertical distribution at a horizontal resolution of 5 km and additional AERONET (Aerosol Robotic Network) data. Two study cases are analyzed: a strong long-range transport mineral dust event (aerosol optical depth, AOD, of 0.52) that originated in the Sahara Desert and reached the United Kingdom and a weaker event (AOD D0.16) that affected eastern Europe. The radiative fluxes obtained are first validated in terms of radiative efficiency at a single point with space– time colocated lidar ground-based measurements from EARLINET (European Aerosol Research Lidar Network) stations below the orbit. The methodology is then applied to the full orbit. The strong dependence of the radiative effects on the aerosol load (and to a lesser extent on the surface albedo) highlights the need for accurate AOD measurements for radiative studies. The calculated dust radiative effects and heating rates below the orbits are in good agreement with previous studies of mineral dust, with the radiative efficiency obtained at the surface ranging between -80:3 and -63:0Wm-2 for lower dust concentration event and -119:1 and -79:3Wm-2 for the strong event. Thus, results demonstrate the validity of the method presented here to retrieve 2-D accurate radiative properties with large spatial and temporal coverage. This work was supported by the Juan de la Cierva-Formación program (grant no. FJCI-2015-23904); the European Union through the H2020 program (ACTRIS-2, grant no. 654109; ECARS, grant no. 602014; EUNADICS-AV, grant no. 723986); the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness CE17 55 (project TEC2015-63832-P); the EFRD (European Fund for Regional Development); the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (project CGL2017-90884-REDT); and the Unidad de Excelencia Maria de Maeztu (project MDM-2016- 0600) financed by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación.