Adjusting elemental carbon emissions in Northeast Asia using observed surface concentrations of downwind area and simulated contributions

Yoon-Hee Kang; Kyuwon Son; Byeong-Uk Kim; YuWoon Chang; Hyun Cheol Kim; Joshua P Schwarz; Soontae Kim

doi:10.1016/j.envint.2023.108069

Adjusting elemental carbon emissions in Northeast Asia using observed surface concentrations of downwind area and simulated contributions

Environ Int. 2023 Aug:178:108069. doi: 10.1016/j.envint.2023.108069. Epub 2023 Jun 27.

Authors

Yoon-Hee Kang¹, Kyuwon Son², Byeong-Uk Kim³, YuWoon Chang⁴, Hyun Cheol Kim⁵, Joshua P Schwarz⁶, Soontae Kim⁷

Affiliations

¹ Environmental Research Institute, Ajou University, Suwon, Republic of Korea.
² Department of Environmental Engineering, Ajou University, Suwon, Republic of Korea.
³ Georgia Environmental Protection Division, Atlanta, GA 30354, United States.
⁴ Department of Air Quality Research, Climate and Air Quality Research Division, National Institute of Environmental Research, Incheon, Republic of Korea.
⁵ Cooperative Institute for Satellite Earth System Studies, University of Maryland, MD 20742, United States; Air Resources Laboratory, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, College Park, MD 20740, United States.
⁶ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Earth System Research Laboratory, Chemical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO 80305, United States.
⁷ Department of Environmental and Safety Engineering, Ajou University, Suwon, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: soontaekim@ajou.ac.kr.

PMID: 37419059
DOI: 10.1016/j.envint.2023.108069

Abstract

In this study, we developed a practical approach to augment elemental carbon (EC) emissions to improve the reproducibility of the most recent air quality with photochemical grid modeling in support of source-receptor relationship analysis. We demonstrated the usefulness of this approach with a series of simulations for EC concentrations over Northeast Asia during the 2016 Korea-United States Air Quality study. Considering the difficulty of acquiring EC observational data in foreign countries, our approach takes two steps: (1) augmenting upwind EC emissions based on simulated upwind contributions and observational data at a downwind EC monitor considered as the most representative monitor for upwind influences and (2) adjusting downwind EC emissions based on simulated downwind contributions, including the effects of updated upwind emissions from the first step and observational data at the downwind EC monitors. The emission adjustment approach resulted in EC emissions 2.5 times higher than the original emissions in the modeling domain. The EC concentration in the downwind area was observed to be 1.0 μg m^-3 during the study period, while the simulated EC concentration was 0.5 μg m^-3 before the emission adjustment. After the adjustment, the normalized mean error of the daily mean EC concentration decreased from 48 % to 22 % at ground monitor locations. We found that the EC simulation results were improved at high altitudes, and the contribution of the upwind areas was greater than that of the downwind areas for EC concentrations downwind with or without emission adjustment. This implies that collaborating with upwind regions is essential to alleviate high EC concentrations in downwind areas. The developed emission adjustment approach can be used for any upwind or downwind area when transboundary air pollution mitigation is needed because it provides better reproducibility of the most recent air quality through modeling with improved emission data.

Keywords: Air quality model; Elemental carbon; Emission adjustment; Korea-United States Air Quality; Source-receptor relationship.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Air Pollutants* / analysis
Air Pollution* / analysis
Asia
Carbon / analysis
Environmental Monitoring / methods
Particulate Matter / analysis
Reproducibility of Results
United States
Vehicle Emissions / analysis

Substances

Air Pollutants
Particulate Matter
Vehicle Emissions
Carbon