Numerical study of the air quality in the city of Sofia - some preliminary results

Abstract

Some extensive numerical simulations of the atmospheric composition fields in the city of Sofia have been recently performed. The simulations were carried out using the following set of models: the model WRF used as meteorological pre-processor; CMAQ - the community multiscale air quality system - the chemical transport model; SMOKE - the sparse matrix operator kernel emissions modelling system - the emission model. As the NCEP global analysis data with one degree resolution was used as meteorological background, the WRF and CMAQ nesting capabilities were applied for downscaling the simulations to a 1 km resolution over Sofia. The national emission inventory was used as an emission input for Bulgaria, while outside the country the emissions were taken from the TNO inventory. The biogenic emissions of VOC are estimated by the model SMOKE. Different characteristics of the numerically obtained concentration fields, including air quality indices will be demonstrated in the present paper.