Abstract
Freely available data of sulfur dioxide (SO2), ammonia (NH3), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3), and particulate matter (PM) observed in Arctic cities (north of 59.99 N) between 1972 and 2016 were compiled into an air-quality inventory of samples taken for limited periods. For cities with multiple years of data, air-quality climatology was determined in terms of daily means in the annual course. Mean urban air-quality climatology was calculated for regions of similar insolation, emission standards, topography, Köppen-Geiger classification, and city size. Urban concentrations of PM precursors (SO2, NH3, NO2), PM2.5 and PM10 (PM with diameter less than 2.5 and 10 μm) were assessed in the sense of climatology with evidence from current knowledge. Typically, annual SO2 and NO2 means were lower for small than large Arctic cities, but can vary more than an order of magnitude over short distance. Cities seeing seasonal sea-ice had W-shaped mean annual courses of daily O3, while other cities had a spring maximum. Typically, annual means of urban pollutants in North America exceeded those in Scandinavia except for O3, where the opposite was true. Annual mean urban PM2.5 and PM10 concentrations varied from 1.6 to 21.2 μg·m-3 and 2 to 18.2 μg·m-3, respectively. Since PM10 encompasses PM2.5, annual PM10 means must be at least 21.2 μg·m-3. According to rural-to-urban ratios of species, seasonal transport of pollutants from wildfires, shipping, and the Kola Peninsula mining area occurred at some sites in Interior Alaska, western and northern Norway, respectively. Concurrent SO2 and PM or NO2 and PM measurements revealed combustion or traffic as major contributors to urban concentrations. Recommendations for potential future measurements of Arctic urban air quality were given based on the assessments of climatology and inventory.
Highlights
Urban air quality in the Arctic is not well understood for various reasons
We discussed the compiled urban air-quality inventory, site air-quality climatology, and urban air-quality climatology determined for the aforementioned groups concurrently to avoid redundancies
Available data of SO2, NO2, NH3, O3, PM2.5 and PM of diameter less than 10 μm (PM10) observed in cities and at rural sites north of 59.99N between 1972 and 2016 were downloaded
Summary
Urban air quality in the Arctic is not well understood for various reasons. Network maintenance to keep instruments functional is high due to low temperatures and icing. Fossil-fuel consuming transportable generators, as often applied during special field campaigns, are unsuitable for long-term monitoring. Such generators would affect air-quality measurements by their own emissions. In the North American Arctic, many communities are off the road network requiring expensive travel by boat or small aircraft for network maintenance [1]. In the Arctic, most observational data were collected in protected areas like natural reserves, National Parks, wilderness areas, or at low populated research stations
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