Abstract
Abstract. Air pollutant emissions play a determinant role in deteriorating air quality. However, an uncertainty in emission inventories is still the key problem for modeling air pollution. In this study, an updated emission inventory of coal-fired power plants (UEIPP) based on online monitoring data in Jiangsu Province of East China for the year of 2012 was implemented in the widely used Multi-resolution Emission Inventory for China (MEIC). By employing the Weather Research and Forecasting model with Chemistry (WRF-Chem), two simulation experiments were executed to assess the atmospheric environment change by using the original MEIC emission inventory and the MEIC inventory with the UEIPP. A synthetic analysis shows that power plant emissions of PM2.5, PM10, SO2, and NOx were lower, and CO, black carbon (BC), organic carbon (OC) and NMVOCs (non-methane volatile organic compounds) were higher in UEIPP relative to those in MEIC, reflecting a large discrepancy in the power plant emissions over East China. In accordance with the changes in UEIPP, the modeled concentrations were reduced for SO2 and NO2, and increased for most areas of primary OC, BC, and CO. Interestingly, when the UEIPP was used, the atmospheric oxidizing capacity significantly reinforced. This was reflected by increased oxidizing agents, e.g., O3 and OH, thus directly strengthening the chemical production from SO2 and NOx to sulfate and nitrate, respectively, which offset the reduction of primary PM2.5 emissions especially on haze days. This study indicates the importance of updating air pollutant emission inventories in simulating the complex atmospheric environment changes with implications on air quality and environmental changes.
Highlights
East China is one of the regions with serious air pollution and frequent haze. In these highly polluted regions, air pollutant emissions play a key role in air quality, and their variations can cause a large uncertainty in air pollution modeling and prediction
When the updated emission inventory of coalfired power plants (UEIPP) was introduced to Multi-resolution Emission Inventory for China (MEIC) by replacing the original power plant emission, the UEIPP contributed 10.4, 3.7, 4.0, 17.2, 6.2, 4.3, 1.7, and 0.9 %, to the total emissions of SO2, PM2.5, PM10, nitrogen oxides (NOx), carbon monoxide (CO), black carbon (BC), organic carbon (OC), and non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs), respectively
The variation and complexity of the atmospheric environment in response to the change of power plant emissions over Jiangsu were studied by executing the WRFChem simulations using the original emissions of MEIC and the MEIC with its power plant emission inventory updated by the UEIPP
Summary
East China is one of the regions with serious air pollution and frequent haze. In these highly polluted regions, air pollutant emissions play a key role in air quality, and their variations can cause a large uncertainty in air pollution modeling and prediction. As the largest coal-fired sector of the emission framework in China, electric power generation is believed to be the most important source of atmospheric pollutant emissions (Zhao et al, 2010). Power plants emit air pollutants with longer life cycles in the upper air and more efficiently transport across regions because of less deposition driven by stronger winds and a well organized circulation in the upper air, e.g., by low-level jets (Hu et al, 2013) This leads to more significant environmental effects than surface emissions (e.g., on-road emissions), reflecting the potential importance of accurately estimating the power plant emissions and their influences on air quality.
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