Dynamic biomass burning emission factors and their impact on atmospheric CO mixing ratios

[1] Biomass burning is a major source of trace gases and aerosols, influencing atmospheric chemistry and climate. To quantitatively assess its impact, an accurate representation of fire emissions is crucial for the atmospheric modeling community. So far, most studies rely on static emission factors (EF) which convert estimates of dry matter burned to trace gas and aerosol emissions. These EFs are often based on the arithmetic mean of field measurements stratified by biome, neglecting the variability in time and space. Here we present global carbon monoxide (CO) emission estimates from fires based on six EF scenarios with different spatial and temporal variability, using dry matter emission estimates from the Global Fire Emissions Database (GFED). We used the TM5 model to transport these different bottom-up estimates in the atmosphere and found that including spatial and temporal variability in EFs impacted CO mixing ratios substantially. Most scenarios estimated higher CO mixing ratios (up to 40% more CO from fires during the burning season) over boreal regions compared to the GFED standard run, while a decrease (~15%) was estimated over the continent of Africa. A comparison to atmospheric CO observations showed differences of 10–20?ppb between the scenarios and systematic deviations from local observations. Although temporal correlations of specific EF scenarios improved for certain regions, an overall “best” set of EFs could not be selected. Our results provide a new set of emission estimates that can be used for sensitivity analyses and highlight the importance of better understanding spatial and temporal variability in EFs for atmospheric studies in general and specifically when using CO or aerosols concentration measurements to top-down constrain fire carbon emissions.

[1]  A. Bouwman,et al.  Emission database for global atmospheric research (Edgar) , 1994, Environmental monitoring and assessment.

[2]  Hiren Jethva,et al.  OMI and MODIS observations of the anomalous 2008–2009 Southern Hemisphere biomass burning seasons , 2010 .

[3]  W. Hao,et al.  Trace gas and particle emissions from fires in large diameter and belowground biomass fuels , 2003 .

[4]  C. Justice,et al.  Effect of fuel composition on combustion efficiency and emission factors for African savanna ecosystems , 1996 .

[5]  J. Randerson,et al.  Interannual variability in global biomass burning emissions from 1997 to 2004 , 2006 .

[6]  I. Bertschi,et al.  Long-range transport of ozone, carbon monoxide, and aerosols to the NE Pacific troposphere during the summer of 2003: Observations of smoke plumes from Asian boreal fires , 2005 .

[7]  J. Hadji-Lazaro,et al.  Hindcast experiments of tropospheric composition during the summer 2010 fires over western Russia , 2011 .

[8]  S. K. Akagi,et al.  Airborne and ground-based measurements of the trace gases and particles emitted by prescribed fires in the United States , 2011 .

[9]  Peter Bergamaschi,et al.  The global chemistry transport model TM5: description and evaluation of the tropospheric chemistry version 3.0 , 2010 .

[10]  Dylan B. A. Jones,et al.  The zonal structure of tropical O 3 and CO as observed by the Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer in November 2004 – Part 1: Inverse modeling of CO emissions , 2009 .

[11]  M. Buchwitz,et al.  Global Estimates of CO Sources with High Resolution by Adjoint Inversion of Multiple Satellite Datasets (MOPITT, AIRS, SCIAMACHY, TES) , 2009 .

[12]  J. Lacaux,et al.  Determination of biomass burning emission factors: Methods and results , 1995, Environmental monitoring and assessment.

[13]  P. M. Lang,et al.  Reanalysis of tropospheric CO trends: Effects of the 1997–1998 wildfires , 2003 .

[14]  A. Guenther,et al.  The tropical forest and fire emissions experiment: laboratory fire measurements and synthesis of campaign data , 2008 .

[15]  G. Brasseur,et al.  Global Wildland Fire Emission Model (GWEM): Evaluating the use of global area burnt satellite data , 2004 .

[16]  Christopher I. Roos,et al.  Fire in the Earth System , 2009, Science.

[17]  Radical loss in the atmosphere from Cu-Fe redox coupling in aerosols , 2012 .

[18]  P. Goovaerts,et al.  Uncertainty in estimating carbon emissions from boreal forest fires , 2004 .

[19]  C. Justice,et al.  Seasonal variation and ecosystem dependence of emission factors for selected trace gases and PM2.5 for southern African savanna fires , 2003 .

[20]  J. Randerson,et al.  Time-dependent inversion estimates of global biomass-burning CO emissions using Measurement of Pollution in the Troposphere (MOPITT) measurements , 2006 .

[21]  J. Randerson,et al.  Global burned area and biomass burning emissions from small fires , 2012 .

[22]  D. Koch,et al.  Global impacts of aerosols from particular source regions and sectors , 2007 .

[23]  D. Ward,et al.  Trace gas emissions from laboratory biomass fires measured by open-path Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy: Fires in grass and surface fuels , 1999 .

[24]  W. Hao,et al.  Trace gas measurements in nascent, aged, and cloud‐processed smoke from African savanna fires by airborne Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (AFTIR) , 2003 .

[25]  J. Chow,et al.  Moisture effects on carbon and nitrogen emission from burning of wildland biomass , 2010 .

[26]  I. R. Burling,et al.  Laboratory measurements of trace gas emissions from biomass burning of fuel types from the southeastern and southwestern United States , 2010 .

[27]  S. Houweling,et al.  Early anthropogenic CH4 emissions and the variation of CH4 and 13CH4 over the last millennium , 2008 .

[28]  J. Randerson,et al.  Assessing variability and long-term trends in burned area by merging multiple satellite fire products , 2009 .

[29]  C. Huntingford,et al.  Indirect radiative forcing of climate change through ozone effects on the land-carbon sink , 2007, Nature.

[30]  Florian Siegert,et al.  Satellite‐derived 2003 wildfires in southern Siberia and their potential influence on carbon sequestration , 2009 .

[31]  W. Hao,et al.  Seasonality of carbon emissions from biomass burning in a Zambian savanna , 1999 .

[32]  R. Francey,et al.  Interannual growth rate variations of atmospheric CO2 and its δ13C, H2, CH4, and CO between 1992 and 1999 linked to biomass burning , 2002 .

[33]  Peter Bergamaschi,et al.  Inverse modelling of national and European CH4 emissions using the atmospheric zoom model TM5 , 2005 .

[34]  I. Aben,et al.  Comparing optimized CO emission estimates using MOPITT or NOAA surface network observations , 2012 .

[35]  J. Lamarque,et al.  Observations of carbon monoxide and aerosols from the Terra satellite: Northern Hemisphere variability , 2004 .

[36]  D. Roy,et al.  An active-fire based burned area mapping algorithm for the MODIS sensor , 2009 .

[37]  D. Blake,et al.  Emission factors of hydrocarbons, halocarbons, trace gases and particles from biomass burning in Brazil , 1998 .

[38]  P. Crutzen,et al.  Comprehensive Laboratory Measurements of Biomass-Burning Emissions: 1. Emissions from Indonesian, African, and Other Fuels , 2003 .

[39]  S. K. Akagi,et al.  Trace gas and particle emissions from open biomass burning in Mexico , 2011 .

[40]  P. Crutzen,et al.  Biomass Burning in the Tropics: Impact on Atmospheric Chemistry and Biogeochemical Cycles , 1990, Science.

[41]  Michael Brauer,et al.  Estimated Global Mortality Attributable to Smoke from Landscape Fires , 2012, Environmental health perspectives.

[42]  I. Aben,et al.  Interannual variability of carbon monoxide emission estimates over South America from 2006 to 2010 , 2012 .

[43]  A. Bouwman,et al.  Emission database for global atmospheric research (Edgar) , 1994, Environmental monitoring and assessment.

[44]  Gareth Roberts,et al.  Field determination of biomass burning emission ratios and factors via open-path FTIR spectroscopy and fire radiative power assessment: headfire, backfire and residual smouldering combustion in African savannahs , 2011 .

[45]  Sara Janhäll,et al.  Biomass burning aerosol emissions from vegetation fires: particle number and mass emission factors and size distributions , 2009 .

[46]  D. Griffith,et al.  Open-path Fourier transform infrared studies of large-scale laboratory biomass fires , 1996 .

[47]  M. Andreae,et al.  Emission of trace gases and aerosols from biomass burning , 2001 .

[48]  J. F. Meirink,et al.  Optimizing global CO emission estimates using a four-dimensional variational data assimilation system and surface network observations , 2011 .

[49]  Glenn S. Diskin,et al.  Nitrogen oxides and PAN in plumes from boreal fires during ARCTAS-B and their impact on ozone: an integrated analysis of aircraft and satellite observations , 2010 .

[50]  J. Penner,et al.  Estimates of CO emissions from open biomass burning in southern Africa for the year 2000 , 2005 .

[51]  David P. Roy,et al.  Southern Africa Validation of the MODIS, L3JRC, and GlobCarbon Burned-Area Products , 2009, IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing.

[52]  Richard G. Derwent,et al.  Multimodel simulations of carbon monoxide: Comparison with observations and projected near‐future changes , 2006 .

[53]  D. Hauglustaine,et al.  Multi-species inversion of CH4, CO and H2 emissions from surface measurements , 2008 .

[54]  S. W. Maier,et al.  Direct measurements of the seasonality of emission factors from savanna fires in northern Australia , 2012 .

[55]  Thomas W. Kirchstetter,et al.  Emissions of trace gases and aerosols during the open combustion of biomass in the laboratory , 2009 .

[56]  Glenn S. Diskin,et al.  Source attribution and interannual variability of Arctic pollution in spring constrained by aircraft (ARCTAS, ARCPAC) and satellite (AIRS) observations of carbon monoxide , 2009 .

[57]  M. Chin,et al.  Sensitivity of global CO simulations to uncertainties in biomass burning sources , 2007 .

[58]  D. Hauglustaine,et al.  African CO emissions between years 2000 and 2006 as estimated from MOPITT observations , 2008 .

[59]  C. Justice,et al.  Influence of timing and spatial extent of savanna fires in southern Africa on atmospheric emissions , 2003 .

[60]  D. Roy,et al.  The collection 5 MODIS burned area product — Global evaluation by comparison with the MODIS active fire product , 2008 .

[61]  J. Lamarque,et al.  Quantifying CO emissions from the 2004 Alaskan wildfires using MOPITT CO data , 2005 .

[62]  D. Roy,et al.  Modeling and sensitivity analysis of fire emissions in southern Africa during SAFARI 2000 , 2004 .

[63]  M. George,et al.  Satellite- and ground-based CO total column observations over 2010 Russian fires: accuracy of top-down estimates based on thermal IR satellite data , 2011 .

[64]  J. Lamarque,et al.  Operational carbon monoxide retrieval algorithm and selected results for the MOPITT instrument , 2003 .

[65]  D. Griffith,et al.  Emissions from smoldering combustion of biomass measured by open‐path Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy , 1997 .

[66]  P. M. Lang,et al.  Distributions and recent changes of carbon monoxide in the lower troposphere , 1998 .

[67]  C. Justice,et al.  SAFARI-2000 characterization of fuels, fire behavior, combustion completeness, and emissions from experimental burns in infertile grass savannas in western Zambia , 2003 .

[68]  J. F. Meirink,et al.  Evidence for long‐range transport of carbon monoxide in the Southern Hemisphere from SCIAMACHY observations , 2006 .

[69]  M. Brauer,et al.  Woodsmoke Health Effects: A Review , 2007, Inhalation toxicology.

[70]  J. Randerson,et al.  Global fire emissions and the contribution of deforestation, savanna, forest, agricultural, and peat fires (1997-2009) , 2010 .

[71]  S. K. Akagi,et al.  Emission factors for open and domestic biomass burning for use in atmospheric models , 2010 .

[72]  Merritt N. Deeter,et al.  The MOPITT version 4 CO product: Algorithm enhancements, validation, and long‐term stability , 2010 .

[73]  Peter Bergamaschi,et al.  European Geosciences Union Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics , 2005 .

[74]  J. Muller,et al.  How much CO was emitted by the 2010 fires around Moscow , 2012 .

[75]  D. Roy,et al.  Modeling and sensitivity analysis of fire emissions in southern Africa during SAFARI 2000 , 2004 .

[76]  Michael B. McElroy,et al.  Three-dimensional climatological distribution of tropospheric OH: Update and evaluation , 2000 .

[77]  S. Korontzi.  Seasonal patterns in biomass burning emissions from southern African vegetation fires for the year 2000 , 2005 .

[78]  J. Penner,et al.  Global estimates of biomass burning emissions based on satellite imagery for the year 2000 , 2004 .