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Title: Relating atmospheric N2O concentration to N2O emission strength in the U. S. Corn Belt

Journal Article · · Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions (Online)
 [1];  [1];  [2];  [3];  [3]
  1. Nanjing Univ. of Information Science and Technology, Jiangsu (China); Yale Univ., New Haven, CT (United States)
  2. Univ. of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN (United States)
  3. NOAA Earth System Research Lab., Boulder, CO (United States)
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Nitrous oxide (N2O) has a high global warming potential and depletes stratospheric ozone. The U. S. Corn Belt plays an important role in the global anthropogenic N2O budget. To date, studies on local surface N2O emission and the atmospheric N2O budget have commonly used Lagrangian models. In the present study, we used an Eulerian model – Weather Research and Forecasting Chemistry (WRF-Chem) model to investigate the relationships between N2O emission in the Corn Belt and observed atmospheric N2O mixing ratios. Modeled hourly N2O mixing ratios were combined with continuous atmospheric N2O measurements at the KCMP tall tower in Minnesota to constrain agricultural N2O emissions. The modeled spatial patterns of atmospheric N2O were validated against discrete observations at multiple tall towers in the NOAA flask network. After optimization of the surface flux, the model reproduced reasonably well the hourly N2O mixing ratios monitored at the KCMP tower. Agricultural N2O emissions in the EDGAR42 database needed to be scaled up by 19.0 to 28.1 fold to represent the true emission in the Corn Belt from June 1–20, 2010 – a peak emission period. Optimized total N2O emissions were 3.00–4.38, 1.52–2.08, 0.61–0.81 and 0.56–0.75 nmol m–2 s–1 from June 1–20, August 1–20, October 1–20 and December 1–20, 2010, respectively. The simulated spatial patterns of atmospheric N2O mixing ratios were in good agreement with the NOAA discrete observations during the strong emission peak in June. Such spatial patterns illustrate that the IPCC (Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change) underestimate of emissions is not dependent on tower measurement location.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
2013-67019-21364; AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1544422
Journal Information:
Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions (Online), Vol. 2016; ISSN 1680-7375
Publisher:
European Geosciences UnionCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

Figures / Tables (9)

Table 1.(p. 14)table Table 1.
Table 2.(p. 15)table Table 2.
Table 3.(p. 16)table Table 3.
Figure 1.(p. 17)figure Figure 1.
Figure 2.(p. 18)figure Figure 2.
Figure 3.(p. 19)figure Figure 3.
Figure 4.(p. 20)figure Figure 4.
Figure 5.(p. 21)figure Figure 5.
Figure 6.(p. 22)figure Figure 6.

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