Liquid Containing Clouds at the North Slope of Alaska Demonstrate Sensitivity to Local Industrial Aerosol Emissions

Cloud condensation nucleus control alter cloud solar albedo through cloud droplet size. Here, we leverage anthropogenic emissions at the North Slope of Alaska as a natural laboratory to study relationships between aerosols and Arctic liquid-containing clouds. Averaging 14 years of MODIS observations...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Maahn, Maximilian, Goren, Tom, Shupe, Matthew D., Boer, Gijs de
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Wiley 2021
Subjects:
Meteorology
clouds
Alaska
aerosols
pollution
info:eu-repo/classification/ddc/551
ddc:551
Arctic
albedo
north slope
Prudhoe Bay
Online Access:https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:bsz:15-qucosa2-820360
https://ul.qucosa.de/id/qucosa%3A82036
https://ul.qucosa.de/api/qucosa%3A82036/attachment/ATT-0/
Description
Summary:Cloud condensation nucleus control alter cloud solar albedo through cloud droplet size. Here, we leverage anthropogenic emissions at the North Slope of Alaska as a natural laboratory to study relationships between aerosols and Arctic liquid-containing clouds. Averaging 14 years of MODIS observations, we found a reduction in temporally averaged cloud effective radius ( er ) of up to 1.0 μm related to localized pollution. Pronounced regional gradients in cloud frequency of occurrence and liquid water path prohibit the detection of potential changes of these variables. Observed changes of er alter radiative fluxes and increase cloud-reflected shortwave radiation by up to 0.8 W m−2 in the Prudhoe Bay area for the period covered by observations (April–September). Due to the frequent occurrence of liquid-containing clouds, this implies that enhanced local emissions in Arctic regions can impact climate processes.

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