Introducing the VIIRS-based Fire Emission Inventory version 0 (VFEIv0)

Abstract

Abstract. A new open biomass burning inventory is presented that relies on the fire radiative power data from the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on board the Suomi NPP satellite. This VIIRS-based Fire Emission Inventory (VFEI) provides emission data from early 2012 to 2019 for more than 40 species of gases and aerosols at spatial resolutions of around 500 m. We found that VFEI produces similar results when compared to other major inventories in many regions of the world. Additionally, we conducted regional simulations using VFEI with the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model with chemistry (WRF-Chem) for Southern Africa (September 2016) and North America (July–August 2019). We compared aerosol optical depth (AOD) from the model against two observational datasets: the MODIS Multi-Angle Implementation of Atmospheric Correction (MAIAC) product and AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) stations. Results showed good agreement between both simulations and the datasets, with mean AOD biases of around +0.03 for Southern Africa and −0.01 for North America. Both simulations were not only able to reproduce the AOD magnitudes accurately, but also the inter-diurnal variations of smoke concentration. In addition, we made use of the airborne data from the ObseRvations of Aerosols above CLouds and their intEractionS (ORACLES; Southern Africa) and the Fire Influence on Regional to Global Environments Experiment and Air Quality (FIREX-AQ; North America) campaigns to evaluate the simulations. In Southern Africa, results showed correlations higher than 0.77 when comparing carbon monoxide and black carbon. In North America, correlations were lower and biases higher. However, this is because the model was not able to reproduce the timing, shape, and location of individual plumes over complex terrain (Rocky Mountains) during the FIREX-AQ campaign period.

Measurement report: Assessing the impacts of emission uncertainty on aerosol optical properties and radiative forcing from biomass burning in peninsular Southeast Asia

“…Except for QFED, which exhibits a lower ratio of approximately 0.08 (1/13), the ratios for the other BB datasets are greater than or equal to 0.1 (1/10). Ferrada et al (2022) found that QFED emission inventories compared to other inventories (GFED4.1s, FINN1.5, and GFAS1.2) increased BC and OC emissions by up to 5 times in different ecological regions. In addition, differences in emission EFs in Southeast Asia may result in a BC/OC equal to approximately 0.08.…”

“…For a comprehensive understanding of absorbing aerosols emitted by global and/or regional wildfires, the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) on the Sentinel-5 Precursor (S5P) satellite, launched on 13 October 2017, was employed to assess AAOD (Torres et al, 2020;Filonchyk et al, 2022). TROPOMI is a high spectral resolution spectrometer that covers the ultraviolet (UV) to shortwave infrared regions in eight spectral windows, offering enhanced capabilities for atmospheric monitoring compared to Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) satellites (Veefkind et al, 2012).…”

The impact of biomass burning emissions on aerosol concentrations and depositions in the northern South China Sea region

“…It is widely used for regional and global simulation studies of biomass burning (Reddington et al, 2019;Vongruang and Pimonsree, 2020). Notably, compared with other biomass burning emission inventories (such as the Global Fire Emissions Database, GFED), BB emissions from the FINN inventory are higher in the MSEA region (Liu et al, 2020;Ferrada et al, 2022). Several modeling studies using different model systems have shown that simulation results with the FINN inventory were better than those with other inventories compared to observations in the MSEA region in terms of magnitudes, annual trends, and seasonal variations (Takami et al, 2020;Reddington et al, 2021;Xing et al, 2021).…”

Updated Land Use and Land Cover Information Improves Biomass Burning Emission Estimates

“…Currently, FRP is estimated to each active fire detected by several orbital sensors including, for example, the MODIS sensor. This approach is used by several global BB emission inventories such as Global Fire Assimilation System (GFAS) [23], Fire Energetics and Emissions Research (FEER) [24], and VIIRS-based Fire Emission Inventory version 0 (VFEIv0) [25].…”