Meteorological Elements Used in the Numerical Forecast of PM10 Over the Romanian Territory

Abstract

Abstract Pollutants in large amounts may not only cause severe health problems and damage crops, but may also represent one of the main causes of global warming. Air quality numerical models are very useful tools in forecasting air pollutants transport and spread. Consequently, this paper analyzes the regional concentration of PM10 (a geographical domain representative of Romania’s territory), by using the numerical air quality forecasting model: WRF-CHEM version 3.5. The respective model has been applied on a Romania-centered upon geographical area, for both the two months representative of the warm and cold seasons (June and January 2013, respectively), at a spatial resolution of 10 km, with a 24 hours’ anticipation. For the WRF-CHEM chemistry module to be initiated, values of PM10 emissions were extracted from the TNO (Nederlandse Organisatie voor toegepast natuurwetenschappelijk onderzoek, www.tno.nl) database for 2009. The meteorological parameters required by the weather forecast model were obtained from the numerical output of the ECMWF (www.ecmwf.int) global model. All these meteorological parameters are very important for air quality simulations, especially wind profiles, which are very important assessment tools since they determine where pollutants are transported, and air-temperature as it may largely influence the speed of chemical reactions in the atmosphere. The vertical diffusion is strongly linked to the height of the mixing layer and influences the exchange between the ground layers and the open troposphere. In order to highlight the quality of the numerical forecasts for PM10 from the WRF-CHEM model, the results obtained were compared to the measurements obtained through gravimetric methods (average daily values of PM10). Hence, specific measurements were provided by the National Environmental Protection Agency (ANPM).