Effectiveness of surface monitoring stations in representing regional CO<sub>2 emissions over India

Abstract

CR Climate Research Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsSpecials CR 56:121-129 (2013) - DOI: https://doi.org/10.3354/cr01149 Effectiveness of surface monitoring stations in representing regional CO2 emissions over India Yogesh K. Tiwari*, Vinu Valsala, Ramesh K. Vellore, Ravi K. Kunchala Centre for Climate Change Research, Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune 411008, India *Email: yktiwari@tropmet.res.in ABSTRACT: The study assesses the usefulness of 2 currently operating CO2 monitoring stations over India using multi-particle back-trajectory analysis derived from the FLEXPART Lagrangian particle dispersion model. The 2 receptors are located at Hanle (HLE) and Cape Rama (CRI); the former is located at the foothills of the Himalayas and the latter is a coastal site near Goa. The particle back-trajectories reaching HLE indicated that probable source regions for CO2 are primarily from northern Africa, the southwestern Eurasia and the south Asian subcontinent. The back-trajectories further indicated a descending pattern from the upper troposphere. Irrespective of the differential flow patterns during summer (June to September) and winter (December to February), the indicated source regions in HLE are nearly similar throughout the year. On the other hand, the source regions in CRI respond to the differential flow pattern, and are primarily from the northeastern part of India during winter and from the southern tropical Indian Ocean during summer. The dispersion in the back-trajectories reaching CRI is relatively smaller than at HLE. This study indicates that the location of CRI (HLE) is appropriate for capturing the regional emissions of CO2 and their short- (long-)range transport from the lower (upper) troposphere. The receptor at CRI was more representative of boundary layer fluxes, while the receptor at HLE was representative of both the boundary layer fluxes and background concentrations from the upper troposphere. KEY WORDS: Atmospheric CO2 · Lagrangian transport modeling · Indian monsoon Full text in pdf format PreviousNextCite this article as: Tiwari YK, Valsala V, Vellore RK, Kunchala RK (2013) Effectiveness of surface monitoring stations in representing regional CO2 emissions over India. Clim Res 56:121-129. https://doi.org/10.3354/cr01149 Export citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in CR Vol. 56, No. 2. Online publication date: March 12, 2013 Print ISSN: 0936-577X; Online ISSN: 1616-1572 Copyright © 2013 Inter-Research.