Engineering topics

Antti Arola

Publications and source records attributed to Antti Arola.

3 records

NASA NTRS2023

The Extreme Forest Fires in California/Oregon in 2020: Aerosol Optical and Physical Properties and Comparisons of Aged Versus Fresh Smoke

Wildfire activity in the western United States during August to October 2020 was exceptional in terms of the fire severity and area burned. Extremely dry biomass fuels from near historic multi-year drought conditions were further exacerbated with very hot and dry conditions in 2020. These conditions when coupled with strong offshore flow allowed many ignitions to grow into extremely large and severe wildfires. Long-term monitoring at a few AERONET sites in California showed that the number of days with high Aerosol Optical Depth at 440 nm (AOD 440 >1) in 2020 was greater than any other year going back to the beginning of the data records in 2002. A wide range of fine mode particle volume median radii were retrieved from AERONET data over the course of these fires suggesting significant variability in combustion conditions and aging processes. Additionally, the fine mode radii in some of these smoke plumes in 2020 were very large especially at high AOD (∼0.22–0.32 μm volume median radius), likely due to both coagulation and condensation occurring during aging at very high particulate concentrations. The largest fine mode particle radii combined with narrow distributions resulted in some very rare AOD spectra showing peak AOD at 500 nm and decreasing to lower AOD at both shorter and longer wavelengths. The most extreme retrieved size distributions and associated measured AOD spectra were principally observed in long-distance transported smoke plumes from these western United States fires at sites in Colorado, Maryland and Virginia, possibly due to further aging during transport. Additionally, strong absorption was sometimes observed at short wavelengths with much lower single scattering albedo at 440 nm compared to 675 nm in some plumes consistent with significant brown carbon (BrC) and/or coated black carbon (BC) absorption in biomass burning particles. This strong spectral absorption signature observed at some California sites and dates remained similarly strong in some smoke plumes observed at some east coast sites in Maryland and Virginia, thereby suggesting that the lifetime of these particular BrC and/or coated BC absorbing species was greater than 5 days.

Aerosol↗

NASA NTRS2021

Analysis of Aeronet Extended Wavelength Retrievals of Aerosol Absorption Parameters Including 380 NM and 500 NM for Detection of Brown Carbon in Biomass Burning and Iron Oxides in Desert Dust

To investigate near UV aerosol absorbers, such as iron in mineral dust and brown carbon from biomass burning, AERONET spectral imaginary refractive index and size distributions retrievals were performed with the input of additional wavelength data. This includes adding both measured spectral AOD and sky radiances at 380 nm and 500 nm to the four channels (440, 675, 870 and 1020 nm) that are used in the standard retrieval data product. The vector radiative transfer code in the AERONET Version 3 retrievals enabled more accurate computations in the ultraviolet region (380 nm). Calibration of the 380 nm channel radiances was done by the vicarious method since the integrating sphere radiance source that is used for all other wavelengths does not produce sufficient energy at 380 nm. Spectral single scattering albedo, imaginary refractive indices and aerosol size distributions from these six wavelength retrievals are compared to the standard four wavelength retrieval values.

Aerosol↗

NASA NTRS2020

Constraining the Twomey effect from satellite observations: Issues and perspectives

The Twomey effect describes the radiative forcing associated with a change in cloud albedo due to an increase in anthropogenic aerosol emissions. It is driven by the perturbation in cloud droplet number concentration (ΔNd,ant) in liquid-water clouds and is currently understood to exert a cooling effect on climate. The Twomey effect is the key driver in the effective radiative forcing due to aerosol–cloud interactions which also comprises rapid adjustments. These adjustments are essentially the responses of cloud fraction and liquid water path to ΔNd,ant and thus scale approximately with it. While the fundamental physics of the influence of added aerosol particles on the droplet concentration (Nd) is well described by established theory at the particle scale (micrometres), how this relationship is expressed at the large scale (hundreds of kilometres) ΔNd,ant remains uncertain. The discrepancy between process understanding at particle scale and insufficient quantification at the climate-relevant large scale is caused by co-variability of aerosol particles and vertical wind and by droplet sink processes. These operate at scales on the order of 10s of metres at which only localized observations are available and at which no approach exists yet to quantify the anthropogenic perturbation. Different atmospheric models suggest diverse magnitudes of the Twomey effect even when applying the same anthropogenic aerosol emission perturbation. Thus, observational data are needed to quantify and constrain the Twomey effect. At the global scale, this means satellite data. There are three key uncertainties in determining ΔNd,ant, namely the quantification (i) of the cloud-active aerosol – the cloud condensation nuclei concentrations (CCN) at or above cloud base –, (ii) of Nd, as well as (iii) the statistical approach for inferring the sensitivity of Nd to aerosol particles from the satellite data. A fourth uncertainty, the anthropogenic perturbation to CCN concentrations, is also not easily accessible from observational data. This review discusses deficiencies of current approaches for the different aspects of the problem and proposes several ways forward: In terms of CCN, retrievals of optical quantities such as aerosol optical depth suffer from a lack of vertical resolution, size and hygroscopicity information, the non-direct relation to the concentration of aerosols, the impossibility to quantify it within or below clouds, and the problem of insufficient sensitivity at low concentrations, in addition to retrieval errors. A future path forward can include utilizing colocated polarimeter and lidar instruments, ideally including high spectral resolution lidar capability at two wavelengths to maximize vertically resolved size distribution information content. In terms of Nd, a key problem is the lack of operational retrievals of this quantity, and the inaccuracy of the retrieval especially in broken-cloud regimes. As for the Nd – to – CCN sensitivity, key issues are the updraught distributions and the role of Nd sink processes, for which empirical assessments for specific cloud regimes are currently the best solutions. These considerations point to the conclusion that past studies using existing approaches have likely underestimated the true sensitivity and, thus, the radiative forcing due to the Twomey effect.

Twomey effect↗