References

ACPD

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions

ACPD

1680-7375

Copernicus GmbH

Göttingen, Germany

10.5194/acpd-11-8027-2011

Simulation of the mineral dust content over Western Africa with the CHIMERE-DUST model from the event to the annual scale

Schmechtig

¹ Marticorena

¹ Chatenet

¹ Bergametti

¹ Rajot

J. L.

LISA, UMR CNRS 7583, Universités Paris Est-Paris Diderot, Créteil, France

IRD-UMR 211 BIOEMCO, Niamey, Niger

09 03 2011

11 3 8027 8079

This is an open-access article ditributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

This article is available from http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/11/8027/2011/acpd-11-8027-2011.html

The full text article is available as a PDF file from http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/11/8027/2011/acpd-11-8027-2011.pdf

The chemistry and transport model CHIMERE-Dust have been used to simulate the mineral dust cycle over the Sahara in 2006. Surface measurements deployed during the AMMA field campaign allows to test the capability of the model to correctly reproduce the atmospheric dust load and surface concentrations from the daily to the seasonal time-scale. The seasonal pattern simulated for Aerosol Optical Depth and surface concentrations are in good agreement with observations. The simulated daily concentrations and hourly AOD are in the same range than the observed one despite relatively high simulated dust emissions. At the different time-scales, the quantitative agreement between the simulations and the observations is fairly good. The capability of the model to reproduce the altitude of the dust transport was tested for two contrasted cases of low and high altitude transport. These results highlights the sensitivity of the simulations to the surface winds used as external forcing and the necessity to further constrain the dust mass budget at the regional scale.

References 1

Alfaro, S. C. and Gomes, L.: Modeling mineral aerosol production by wind erosion: Emission intensities and aerosol distributions in source areas, J. Geophys. Res, 106, 18075–18084, 2001.

Alfaro, S. C., Rajot, J. L., and Nickling, W.: Estimation of PM20 emissions by wind erosion: Main sources of uncertainties, Geomorphology, 59, 63–74, 2004.

Acker, J. G. and Leptoukh, G.: Online Analysis Enhances Use of NASA Earth Science Data, Eos, Trans. AGU, 88(2) , 14–17, 2007.

Bessagnet, B., Hodzic, A., Vautard, R., Beekmann, M., Cheinet, S., Honoré, C., Liousse, C., and Rouil, L.: Aerosol modeling with CHIMERE - preliminary evaluation at the continental scale, Atmos. Environ., 38, 2803–2817, 2004.

Bou Karam, D., Flamant, C., Tulet, P., Todd, M. C., Pelon, J., and Williams, E.: Dry cyclogenesis and dust mobilization in the intertropical discontinuity of the West African Monsoon: A case study, J. Geophys. Res., 114, D05115, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD010952doi:10.1029/2008JD010952, 2009.

Bouet, C., Cautenet, G., Washington, R., Todd, M. C., Laurent, B., Marticorena, B., and Bergametti,G.: Mesoscale modeling of aeolian dust emission during the BoDEx 2005 experiment, Geophys. Res. Lett., 34, L07812, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2006GL029184doi:10.1029/2006GL029184, 2007.

Cakmur, R. V., Miller, R. L., Perlwitz, J., Geogdzhayev, I. V., Ginoux, P., Koch, D., Kohfeld, K. E., Tegen, I., and Zender, C. S.: Constraining the magnitude of the global dust cycle by minimizing the difference between a model and observations, J. Geophys. Res., 111, D06207, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2005JD005791doi:10.1029/2005JD005791, 2006.

Callot, Y., Marticorena, B., and Bergametti,: Geomorphologic approach for modelling the surface features of arid env G.ironments in a model of dust emissions:~application to the Sahara desert, Geodin. Acta, 13, 245–270, 2000.

Cavalieri O., Di Donfrancesco, G., Cairo, F., Fierli, F., Snels, M., Viterbini, M., Cardillo, F., Chatenet, B., Formenti, P., Marticorena, B. and Rajot, J. L.: The AMMA mulid network for aerosol characterization in West Africa, Int. J. Remote Sens., doi:10.1080/01431161.2010.502156, in press, 2011.

d'Almeida, G. A.: A model for Saharan dust transport, J. Clim. Appl. Meteorol., 25, 903–916, 1986.

d'Almeida, G. A. and Schütz, L.: Number, mass and volume distributions, of mineral aerosols and soils of Sahara, J. Clim. Appl. Meteorol., 22, 233–243, 1983.

Dentener F. J., Carmichael, G. R., Zhang, Y., Lelieveld, J., and Crutzen, P.: The role of mineral aerosol as a reactive surface in the global troposphere, J. Geophys. Res., 101, 22869–22889, 1996.

Duce, R. A.: Sources, distributions, and fluxes of mineral aerosols and their relationship to climate, in: Aerosol Forcing of Climate, edited by: Charlson, R. J. and Heintzenberg, J., Wiley, New-York, 43–72, 1995.

Flamant, C., Chaboureau, J.-P., Parker, D. J., Taylor, C., Cammas, J.-P., Bock, O., Timouk, F., and Pelon, J.: Airborne observations of the impact of a convective system on the planetary boundary layer thermodynamics and aerosol distribution in the inter-tropical discontinuity region of the West African Monsoon, Q. J. Roy. Meteorol. Soc., 133, 1175–1189, 2007.

Forêt, G., Bergametti, G., Dulac, F., and Menut, L.: An optimized particle size bin scheme for modelling mineral dust aerosols, J. Geophys. Res., 111, D17310, doi:10-1029/2005JD006797, 2006.

Ginoux, P., Chin, M., Tegen, I., Prospero, J., Holben, B., Dubovik, O., and Lin, S. J.: Sources and distributions of dust aerosols simulated with the GOCART model, J. Geophys. Res., 106, 20255–20273, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2000JD000053doi:10.1029/2000JD000053, 2001.

Goudie, A. S. and Middleton, N. J.: Saharan dust storms: Nature and consequences, Earth Sci. Rev., 56, 179–204, 2001.

Guelle, W., Balkanski, Y., Schulz, M., Marticorena, B., Bergametti, G., Moulin, C., Arimoto, R., and Perry, K. D.: Modeling the atmospheric distribution of mineral aerosol: comparison with ground measurements and satellite observations for yearly and synoptic time scales over the North Atlantic., J. Geophys. Res., 105, 1997–2001, 2000.

Haywood, J. M., Pelon, J., Formenti, P., Bharmal, N., Brooks, M., Capes, G., Chazette, P., Chou, C., Christopher, S., Coe, H., Cuesta, J., Derimian, Y., Desboeufs, K., Greed, G., Harrison, M., Heese, B., Highwood, E. J., Johnson, B., Mallet, M., Marticorena, B., Marsham, J., Milton, S., Myhre, G., Osborne, S., Parker, D. J., Rajot, J.-L., Schulz, M., Slingo, A., Tanré, D., and Tulet, P.: Overview of the Dust and Biomass burning Experiment and African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis Special Observing Period-0, J. Geophys. Res., 113, D00C17, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD010077doi:10.1029/2008JD010077, 2008.

Heinold, B., Helmert, J., Hellmuth, O., Wolke, R., Ansmann, A., Marticorena, B., Laurent, B., and Tegen, I.: Regional modeling of Saharan dust events using LM-MUSCAT: Model description and case studies, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D11204, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2006JD007443doi:10.1029/2006JD007443, 2007.

Herman, J. R., Bhartia, P. K., Torres, O., Hsu, C., Seftor, C., and Celarier, E.: Global distribution of UV-absorbing aerosols from Nimbus 7/TOMS data, J. Geophys. Res., 102, 16911–16922, 1997.

Holben, B. N., Tanre, D., Smirnov, A., Eck, T. F., Slutsker, I., Abuhassan, N., Newcomb, W. W., Schafer, J., Chatenet, B., Lavenu, F., Kaufman, Y., Van de Castle, J., Setzer, A., Markham, B., Clark, D., Frouin, R., Halthore, R., Karnieli, A., O'Neill, N. T., Pietras, C., Pinker, R. T., Voss, K., and Zibordi, G.: An emerging ground-based aerosol climatology: Aerosol Optical Depth from AERONET, J. Geophys. Res., 106, 12067–12098, 2001.

Hsu, N. C., Tsay, S.-C., King, M. D., and Herman, J. R.: Aerosol properties over bright-reflecting source regions, IEEE T. Geosci. Remote, 42(3), 557–569, 2004.

Hsu, N. C., Tsay, S.-C., King, M. D., and Herman, J. R.: Deep blue retrievals of Asian aerosol properties during ACE-Asia, IEEE T. Geosci. Remote, 44(11), 3180–3195, 2006.

Jaenicke, R. and Schütz, L.: Comprehensive study of physical and chemical properties of the surface aerosols in Cape Verde Islands region, J. Geophys. Res., 83, 3585–3599, 1978.

Jickells, T. D., An, Z. S., Andersen, K. K., Baker, A. R., Bergametti, G., Brooks, N., Cao, J. J., Boyd, P. W., Duce, R. A., Hunter, K. A., Kawahata, H., Kubilay, N., La Roche, J., Liss, P. S., Mahowald, N., Prospero, J. M., Ridgwell, A. J., Tegen, I., and Torres, R.: Global iron connections: Between desert dust, ocean biogeochemistry and climate, Science, 308, 67–71, 2005.

Koren, I. and Kaufman, Y. J.: Direct wind measurements of Saharan dust events from Terra and Aqua satellites, Geophys. Res. Lett., 31, L06122, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2003GL019338doi:10.1029/2003GL019338, 2004.

Koren, I., Kaufman, Y. J., Washington, R., Todd, M. C., Rudich, Y., Martins, J. V., and Rosenfeld, D.: The Bodélé depression: A single spot in the Sahara that provides most of the mineral dust to the Amazon forest, Environ. Res. Lett., 1, 014005, http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/1/1/014005doi:10.1088/1748-9326/1/1/014005, 2006.

Laurent, B., Marticorena, B., Bergametti, G., Léon, J. F., and Mahowald, N. M.: Modeling mineral dust emissions from the Sahara desert using new surface properties and soil database, J. Geophys. Res., 113, D14218, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2007JD009484doi:10.1029/2007JD009484, 2008.

Loosmore, G. and Cederwall, R.: Precipitation scavenging of atmospheric aerosols for emergency response applications: Testing an updated model with new real-time data, Atmos. Environ., 38, 993–1003, 2004.

Luo, C., Mahowald, N. M., and del Corral, J.: Sensitivity study of meteorological parameters on mineral aerosol mobilization, transport, and distribution, J. Geophys. Res., 108(D15), 4447, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2003JD003483doi:10.1029/2003JD003483, 2003.

Mahowald, N. M., Jickells, T. D., Baker, A. R., Artaxo, P., Benitez-Nelson, C., Bergametti, G., Bond, T. C., Chen, Y., Cohen, D. D., Heruk, B., Kubilay, N., Losno, , C. Luo, W. Maenhaut, K. A. Mc Gee, G. Okin, R. L. Seifert and S. and Tsukuda, R.: The global distribution of atmospheric phosphorus deposition and anthropogenic impacts, Global Biogeochem. Cy., 22, GB4026, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008GB003240doi:10.1029/2008GB003240, 2008.

Manabe, Y. and Gotlieb, J.: Nitrate formation on sea-salt and mineral particles – a single particle approach, Atmos. Environ., 26A, 1763–1769, 1992.

Marticorena, B. and Bergametti, G.: Modelling the atmospheric dust cycle: 1. Design of a soil derived dust production scheme, J. Geophys. Res., 100, 16415–16430, 1995.

Marticorena, B. and Bergametti, G.: Two-year simulations of seasonal and interannual changes of the Saharan dust emissions, Geophys. Res. Lett., 23, 1921–1924, 1996.

Marticorena, B., Bergametti, G., Aumont, B., Callot, Y., N'Doumé, C., and Legrand, M.: Modeling the atmospheric dust cycle: 2-Simulations of Saharan dust sources, J. Geophys. Res., 102, 4387–4404, 1997.

Marticorena, B., Chatenet, B., Rajot, J. L., Traoré, S., Coulibaly, M., Diallo, A., Koné, I., Maman, A., NDiaye, T., and Zakou, A.: Temporal variability of mineral dust concentrations over West Africa: analyses of a pluriannual monitoring from the AMMA Sahelian Dust Transect, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 10, 8899–8915, http://dx.doi.org/10.5194/acp-10-8899-2010doi:10.5194/acp-10-8899-2010, 2010.

Menut, L.: Adjoint modelling for atmospheric pollution processes sensitivity at regional scale during the ESQUIF IOP2, J. Geophys. Res., 108, 8562, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2002JD002549doi:10.1029/2002JD002549, 2003.

Menut, L., Forêt, G., and Bergametti, G.: Sensitivity of mineral dust concentrations to the model size distribution accuracy, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D10210, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2006JD007766doi:10.1029/2006JD007766, 2007.

Menut, L., Chiapello, I., and Moulin, C.: Predictability of mineral dust concentrations: The African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis first short observation period forecasted with CHIMERE-DUST, J. Geophys. Res., 114, D07202, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD010523doi:10.1029/2008JD010523, 2009.

Moulin, C., Gordon, H. R., Banzon, V. F., and Evans, R. H.: Assessment of Saharan dust absorption in the visible from SeaWiFS imagery, J. Geophys. Res., 106(D16), 18239–18249, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2000JD900812doi:10.1029/2000JD900812, 2001.

N'Tchayi, G. M., Bertrand, J., Legrand, M., and Baudet, J.: Temporal and spatial variations of the atmospheric dust loading throughout West Africa over the last thirty years, Ann. Geophys., 12, 265–273, http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00585-994-0265-3doi:10.1007/s00585-994-0265-3, 1994.

Ogunjobi, K. O., He, Z., and Simmer, C.: Spectral aerosol optical properties from AERONET Sun-photometric measurements over West Africa, Atmos. Res., 88, 89–107, 2008.

Prospero, J. M. and Nees, R. T.: Dust concentration in the atmosphere of the Equatorial North Atlantic: possible relationship to the Sahelian drought, Science, 196, 1196–1198, 1977.

Prospero, J. M. and Nees, R. T.: Impact of the north African drought and El Nino on mineral dust in the Barbados trade winds, Nature, 320, 735–738, 1986.

Prospero, J. M., Ginoux, P., Torres, O., Nicholson, S. E., and Gill, T. E.: Environmental characterization of global sources of atmospheric soil dust identified with the Nimbus 7 Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) absorbing aerosol product, Rev. Geophys., 40(1), 1–31, 2002.

Redelsperger, J. L., Thorncroft, C. D., Diedhiou, A., Lebel, T., Parker, D. J., and Polcher, J.: African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis An International Reasearch Project and Field Campaign, B. Am. Meteorol. Soc., 87(12), 1739, http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-87-12-1739doi:10.1175/BAMS-87-12-1739, 2006.

Schepanski, K., Tegen, I., Todd, M. C., Heinold, B., Bönisch, G., Laurent, B., and Macke, A.: Meteorological processes forcing Saharan dust emission inferred from MSG�]SEVIRI observations of subdaily dust source activation and numerical models, J. Geophys. Res., 114, D10201, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD010325doi:10.1029/2008JD010325, 2009.

Slingo, A., Ackerman, T. P., Allan, R. P., Kassianov, E. I., McFarlane, S. A., Robinson, G. J., Barnard, J. C., Miller, M. A., Harries, J. E., Russell, J. E., and Dewitte, S.: Observations of the impact of a major Saharan dust storm on the atmospheric radiation balance, Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L24817, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2006GL027869doi:10.1029/2006GL027869, 2006.

Slingo, A., Bharmal, N. A., Robinson, G. J., Settle, J. J., Allan, R. P., White, H. E., Lamb, P. J., Issa Lélé, M., Turner, D. D., McFarlane, S., Kassianov, E., Barnard, J., Flynn, C., and Miller, M.: Overview of observations from the RADAGAST experiment in Niamey, Niger. Part 1: Meteorology and thermodynamic variables, J. Geophys. Res, 113, D00E01, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD009909doi:10.1029/2008JD009909, 2008.

Sokolik, I., Winker, D., Bergametti, G., Gillette, D. A., Carmichael, G., Kaufman, Y., Gomes, L., Schütz, L., and Penner, J.: Outstanding problems in quantifying the radiative impact of mineral dust, J. Geophys. Res, 106, 18075–18084, 2001.

Stanelle, T., Vogel, B., Vogel, H., Bäumer, D., and Kottmeier, C.: Feedback between dust particles and atmospheric processes over West Africa during dust episodes in March 2006 and June 2007, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 10, 10771–10788, doi:10.5194/acp-10-10771-2010, 2010.

Swap, R., Garstang, M., Greco, S., Talbot, R., and Kållberg, P.: Saharan dust in the Amazon basin, Tellus, 44B, 133–149, 1992.

Tegen, I. and Fung, I.: Modeling of mineral dust in the atmosphere: Sources, transport, and optical thickness, J. Geophys. Res., 99, 22897–22914, 1994.

Tegen, I. and Lacis, A.: Modeling of particle size distribution and its influence on the radiative properties of mineral dust aerosol, J. Geophys. Res., 101, 19237–19244, 1996.

Tegen, I., Harrison, S. P., Kohfeld, K., Prentice, I. C., Coe, M., and Heimann, M.: Impact of vegetation and preferential source areas on global dust aerosol: Results from a model study, J. Geophys. Res., 107(D21), 4576, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2001JD000963doi:10.1029/2001JD000963, 2002.

Tegen, I., Heinold, B., Todd, M., Helmert, J., Washington, R., and Dubovik, O.: Modelling soil dust aerosol in the Bod�l� depression during the BoDEx campaign, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 6, 4345–4359, http://dx.doi.org/10.5194/acp-6-4345-2006doi:10.5194/acp-6-4345-2006, 2006.

Torres, O., Bhartia, P. K., Herman, J. R., Ahmad, Z., and Gleason, J.: Derivation of aerosol properties from satellite measurements of backscattered ultraviolet radiation: Theoretical basis, J. Geophys. Res., 103, 17099–17110, 1998.

Tulet, P., Mallet, M., Pont, V., Pelon, J., and Boone, A.: The 7–13 March 2006 dust storm over West Africa: Generation, transport, and vertical stratification, J. Geophys. Res., 113, D00C08, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2008JD009871doi:10.1029/2008JD009871, 2008.

Van Leer, B.: Towards the ultimate conservative difference scheme.V A second order sequel to Godunov's method, J. Comput. Phys., 32, 101–136, 1979.

Vautard, R., Beekmann, M., Roux, J., and Gombert, D.: Validation of a deterministic forecasting system for the ozone concentrations over the Paris area, Atmos. Environ., 35 2449–2461, 2001.

Venkatram, A. and Pleim, J.: The electrical analogy does not apply to modeling dry deposition of particles, Atmos. Environ., 33, 3075–3076, 1999.

Wang, M., Knobelspiesse, K. D., and Mc Clain, C. R.: Study of the Sea-Viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) aerosol optical property data over ocean in combination with the ocean color products, J. Geophys. Res., 110, D10S06, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2004JD004950doi:10.1029/2004JD004950, 2005.

Washington, R., Todd, M. C., Engelstaedter, S., M'Bainayel, S., and Mitchell, F.: Dust and the low-level circulation over the Bode'le' Depression, Chad: Observations from BoDEx 2005, J. Geophys. Res., 111, D03201, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2005JD006502doi:10.1029/2005JD006502, 2006.

Wesely, M. L.: Parameterizations of surface resistance to gaseous dry deposition in regional-scale numerical models, Atmos. Environ., 23, 1293–1304, 1989.

Wu, P.-M. and Okada, K.: Nature of the coarse nitrate particles in the atmosphere – A single particle approach, Atmos. Environ., 28, 2053–2060, 1994.

Yoshioka, M., Mahowald, N., Dufresne, J. L., and Luo, C.: Simulation of absorbing aerosol indices for African dust, J. Geophys. Res., 110, D18S17, http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2004JD005276doi:10.1029/2004JD005276, 2005.

Zhao, D., Xiong, J., Xu, Y., and Chan, W. H.: Acid rain in southern China, Atmos. Environ., 22, 349–358, 1988