Aerosol characteristics during winter fog at Agra,North India |
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| Authors: | P D Safai S Kewat G Pandithurai P S Praveen K Ali S Tiwari P S P Rao K B Budhawant S K Saha P C S Devara |
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| Institution: | (1) Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune, 411 008, India;(2) Maldives Climate Observatory, Hanimaadhoo, Maldives;(3) Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, New Delhi Branch, New Delhi, 110 060, India |
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| Abstract: | Simultaneous measurements on physical, chemical and optical properties of aerosols over a tropical semi-arid location, Agra
in north India, were undertaken during December 2004. The average concentration of total suspended particulates (TSP) increased
by about 1.4 times during intense foggy/hazy days. Concentrations of SO4
2−, NO3
−, NH4
+ and Black Carbon (BC) aerosols increased by 4, 2, 3.5 and 1.7 times, respectively during that period. Aerosols were acidic
during intense foggy/hazy days but the fog water showed alkaline nature, mainly due to the neutralizing capacity of NH4 aerosols. Trajectory analyses showed that air masses were predominantly from NW direction, which might be responsible for
transport of BC from distant and surrounding local sources. Diurnal variation of BC on all days showed a morning and an evening
peak that were related to domestic cooking and vehicular emissions, apart from boundary layer changes. OPAC (Optical properties
of aerosols and clouds) model was used to compute the optical properties of aerosols. Both OPAC-derived and observed aerosol
optical depth (AOD) values showed spectral variation with high loadings in the short wavelengths (<1 μm). AOD value at 0.5 μm
wavelength was significantly high during intense foggy/hazy days (1.22) than during clear sky or less foggy/hazy days (0.63).
OPAC-derived Single scattering albedo (SSA) was 0.84 during the observational period, indicating significant contribution
of absorbing aerosols. However, the BC mass fraction to TSP increased by only 1% during intense foggy/hazy days and thereby
did not show any impact on SSA during that period. A large increase was observed in the shortwave (SW) atmospheric (ATM) forcing
during intense foggy/hazy days (+75.8 W/m2) than that during clear sky or less foggy/hazy days (+38 W/m2), mainly due to increase in absorbing aerosols. Whereas SW forcing at surface (SUF) increased from −40 W/m2 during clear sky or less foggy/hazy days to −76 W/m2 during intense foggy/hazy days, mainly due to the scattering aerosols like SO4
2-. |
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| Keywords: | Aerosols on foggy/hazy days Chemical composition Acidity of aerosols and fog water Optical properties Radiative forcing |
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