No abstract

Energetic particle precipitation (EPP) and ion chemistry affect the neutral composition of the polar middle atmosphere. For example, production of odd nitrogen and odd hydrogen during strong events can decrease ozone by tens of percent. However, the standard ion chemistry parameterization used in atmospheric models neglects the effects on some important species, such as nitric acid. We present WACCM-D, a variant of the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model, which includes a set of lower ionosphere (D-region) chemistry: 307 reactions of 20 positive ions and 21 negative ions. We consider realistic ionization scenarios and compare the WACCM-D results to those from the Sodankyl€ a Ion and Neutral Chemistry (SIC), a state-of-the-art 1-D model of the D-region chemistry. We show that WACCM-D produces well the main characteristics of the D-region ionosphere, as well as the overall proportion of important ion groups, in agreement with SIC. Comparison of ion concentrations shows that the WACCM-D bias is typically within 610% or less below 70 km. At 70-90 km, when strong altitude gradients in ionization rates and/or ion concentrations exist, the bias can be larger for some groups but is still within tens of percent. Based on the good agreement overall and the fact that part of the differences are caused by different model setups, WACCM-D provides a state-of-the-art global representation of D-region ion chemistry and is therefore expected to improve EPP modeling considerably. These improvements are demonstrated in a companion paper by Andersson et al.

Abstract. We have used the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model (WACCM), with an updated treatment of loss processes, to determine the atmospheric lifetime of sulfur hexafluoride (SF 6 ). The model includes the following SF 6 removal processes: photolysis, electron attachment and reaction with mesospheric metal atoms. The Sodankylä Ion Chemistry (SIC) model is incorporated into the standard version of WACCM to produce a new version with a detailed D region ion chemistry with cluster ions and negative ions. This is used to determine a latitude-and altitudedependent scaling factor for the electron density in the standard WACCM in order to carry out multi-year SF 6 simulations. The model gives a mean SF 6 lifetime over an 11-year solar cycle (τ ) of 1278 years (with a range from 1120 to 1475 years), which is much shorter than the currently widely used value of 3200 years, due to the larger contribution (97.4 %) of the modelled electron density to the total atmospheric loss. The loss of SF 6 by reaction with mesospheric metal atoms (Na and K) is far too slow to affect the lifetime. We investigate how this shorter atmospheric lifetime impacts the use of SF 6 to derive stratospheric age of air. The age of air derived from this shorter lifetime SF 6 tracer is longer by 9 % in polar latitudes at 20 km compared to a passive SF 6 tracer. We also present laboratory measurements of the infrared spectrum of SF 6 and find good agreement with previous studies. We calculate the resulting radiative forcings and efficiencies to be, on average, very similar to those reported previously. Our values for the 20-, 100-and 500-year global warming potentials are 18 000, 23 800 and 31 300, respectively.

Multimodel Arctic Ocean “climate response function” experiments are analyzed in order to explore the effects of anomalous wind forcing over the Greenland Sea (GS) on poleward ocean heat transport, Atlantic Water (AW) pathways, and the extent of Arctic sea ice. Particular emphasis is placed on the sensitivity of the AW circulation to anomalously strong or weak GS winds in relation to natural variability, the latter manifested as part of the North Atlantic Oscillation. We find that anomalously strong (weak) GS wind forcing, comparable in strength to a strong positive (negative) North Atlantic Oscillation index, results in an intensification (weakening) of the poleward AW flow, extending from south of the North Atlantic Subpolar Gyre, through the Nordic Seas, and all the way into the Canadian Basin. Reconstructions made utilizing the calculated climate response functions explain ∼50% of the simulated AW flow variance; this is the proportion of variability that can be explained by GS wind forcing. In the Barents and Kara Seas, there is a clear relationship between the wind‐driven anomalous AW inflow and the sea ice extent. Most of the anomalous AW heat is lost to the atmosphere, and loss of sea ice in the Barents Sea results in even more heat loss to the atmosphere, and thus effective ocean cooling. Release of passive tracers in a subset of the suite of models reveals differences in circulation patterns and shows that the flow of AW in the Arctic Ocean is highly dependent on the wind stress in the Nordic Seas.

The fluorinated gases SF6 and C2F5Cl (CFC-115) are chemically inert with atmospheric lifetimes of many centuries which, combined with their strong absorption of IR radiation, results in unusually high global warming potentials. Very long lifetimes imply that mesospheric sinks could make important contributions to their atmospheric removal. In order to investigate this, the photolysis cross sections at the prominent solar Lyman-α emission line (121.6 nm), and the reaction kinetics of SF6 and CFC-115 with the neutral meteoric metal atoms Na, K, Mg, and Fe over large temperature ranges, were measured experimentally. The Na and K reactions exhibit significant non-Arrhenius behavior; quantum chemistry calculations of the potential energy surfaces for the SF6 reactions indicate that the Na and K reactions with SF6 are probably activated by vibrational excitation of the F-SF5 (v3) stretching mode. A limited set of kinetic measurements on Na + SF5CF3 are also presented. The atmospheric removal of these long-lived gases by a variety of processes is then evaluated. For SF6, the removal processes in decreasing order of importance are electron attachment, VUV photolysis, and reaction with K, Na, and H. For CFC-115, the removal processes in decreasing order of importance are reaction with O((1)D), VUV photolysis, and reaction with Na, K, and H.