Dust induced radiative perturbations during an episode of long-range dust transport over Delhi, India: a high-resolution regional NWP model study

Abstract

Dust-induced modifications to the radiative fluxes/heating during a light-blocking haze episode over Delhi, India, 7–9th Nov 2017—triggered by long range transport from a severe Saudi Arabian dust storm—have been investigated with a regional NWP model, NCUM-R with prognostic dust-radiation feedbacks. The study employs ‘Double Radiation Calls’, wherein parallel runs of the radiation scheme ‘with’ (prognostic) and ‘without’ (diagnostic) dust radiative effects—while prognostic fields drive the forecast—isolate the dust-induced perturbations. The forecasted dust optical depth agreed spatially with the AOD from MODIS with Angstrom Exponent > 0.5, indicating that the dust was well mixed with the fine mode anthropogenic aerosols upwind. The ‘downward shortwave (SW) flux’ was diminished (upto − 12.9 Wm−2) in layers sampling (i) near-surface (L1Avg), (ii) well-mixed layer within the planetary boundary layer (PBL, L2Avg) and (iii) free-troposphere (FT, L3Avg). Dust-induced ‘Solar heating’ dominated in FT (upto 9.5 × 10–7 Ks−1) and the patches below (in L2Avg) exhibited a cooling, leading to thermal dipoles. The ‘upward longwave (LW) flux’ in FT was reduced and ‘LW heating’ prevailed in all levels—peak (2.5 × 10–6 Ks−1) in L2Avg—along with well-defined cooling zones in L1Avg. The dust–radiation interaction in turn influenced the boundary layer meteorology, manifested as (i) shallow PBLs that spatially correlate with dust-induced cooling of the boundary layer column, (ii) enhanced surface humidity and (iii) reduced visibility. The study is an instance of prognostic dust-radiation feedbacks improving the skill of NWP models in dust-laden regions.