Grantee Research Project Results
2009 Progress Report: Analysis of the Co-benefits of Greenhouse Gas Abatement for Global and US Air Quality under Future Climate Scenarios
EPA Grant Number: R834285Title: Analysis of the Co-benefits of Greenhouse Gas Abatement for Global and US Air Quality under Future Climate Scenarios
Investigators: West, J. Jason , Hanna, Adel , Smith, Steven J. , Horowitz, Larry W. , Emmons, Louisa , Vizuete, William
Institution: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Current Institution: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill , NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory , National Center for Atmospheric Research , Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
EPA Project Officer: Chung, Serena
Project Period: September 1, 2009 through August 31, 2013
Project Period Covered by this Report: September 1, 2009 through November 30,2010
Project Amount: $300,000
RFA: Adaptation for Future Air Quality Analysis and Decision Support Tools in Light of Global Change Impacts and Mitigation (2008) RFA Text | Recipients Lists
Research Category: Air Quality and Air Toxics , Climate Change , Air
Objective:
Actions to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) will affect air quality directly through reductions in emissions of co-emitted air pollutants, and indirectly through changes in global climate. Research on the effects of climate change on air quality has emphasized meteorological downscaling to translate future climate change from general circulation models (GCMs) to a regional scale. Here we propose to emphasize methods of chemical downscaling, in which future climate and pollutant emissions will be simulated in a global chemical transport model (CTM) to provide initial and boundary conditions for a US-focused regional CTM. We use these methods to address the air quality co-benefits of actions to reduce GHG emissions, both globally and in the United States, by analyzing the mitigation of methane emissions and the control of GHGs generally, in future scenarios to 2050.Progress Summary:
Overall, progress under this grant has been very good, and is expected to lead to important findings in future years. Much of the work on this project to date has involved learning, developing, and applying methods of meteorological and chemical downscaling that will be central to the model applications that are central to this project. We have learned that doing the meteorological downscaling well, using the WRF meteorological model, is a significant and important challenge; consequently, we have made significant efforts in this first year to develop and test these methods thoroughly. We now are at the point where we believe we have completed the WRF modeling for the first exercise in which we will model the effects of changes in methane concentrations on ozone and particulate matter (PM) air quality at fine resolution over the United States. We anticipate that these methods will be useful for further applications, including modeling the long-range transport of air pollution, beyond the scope of this project.
Future Activities:
Once the meterological modeling for the first set of simulations is complete, we plan to progress with simulations as planned in the original proposal. We first will address the effects of global reductions in methane on air quality in the United States at fine resolution. We will conduct the simulations outlined in the original proposal – first using existing MOZART-2 simulations and then conducting new global simulations with MOZART-4. We also have identified additional simulations that will give increased scientific and policy insight, including an investigation of the importance of direct reactions involving methane versus changing radical species in the new boundary conditions, and their relevance in explaining differences in responses to methane in MOZART-4 and CMAQ.
Journal Articles on this Report : 1 Displayed | Download in RIS Format
Other project views: | All 15 publications | 6 publications in selected types | All 6 journal articles |
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Smith SJ, West JJ, Kyle P. Economically consistent long-term scenarios for air pollutant emissions. Climatic Change 2011;108(3):619-627. |
R834285 (2009) R834285 (2011) R834285 (2012) R834285 (Final) |
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Supplemental Keywords:
PM2.5, PM10, multi-pollutant strategies, climate-air interactions, RFA, Air, climate change, Air Pollution Effects, Atmosphere, environmental monitoring, greenhouse gases, GHGRelevant Websites:
www.unc.edu/~jjwestProgress and Final Reports:
Original AbstractThe perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.