Wildfire Smoke Influence on Cloud Water Chemical Composition at Whiteface Mountain, New York

Lee, Jamy Y.; Peterson, Peter K.; Vear, Logan R.; Cook, Richard J.; Sullivan, A. P.; Smith, Ellie; Hawkins, L. N.; Olson, Nicole E.; Hems, Rachel F.; Snyder, P. K.; Pratt, Kerri A.

doi:10.1029/2022jd037177

Cited by 5 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…Loría-Salazar et al (2021) analyzed smoke height boundary-layer effects using NASA MODIS and VIIRS aerosol products, using these to document the influence of mountainous terrain on vertical aerosol profiles during extreme smoke events. A study by Lee et al (2022) investigated cloud water samples over eight summers at Whiteface Mountain, New York. These authors found that nearly half of the summertime cloud water samples were influenced by wildfire smoke, which contributed to the addition of sulfate, ammonium, potassium, and total organic carbon.…”

Section: How Does Fire Work? Physical and Chemical Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A study by Lee et al. (2022) investigated cloud water samples over eight summers at Whiteface Mountain, New York. These authors found that nearly half of the summertime cloud water samples were influenced by wildfire smoke, which contributed to the addition of sulfate, ammonium, potassium, and total organic carbon.…”

Section: How Does Fire Work? Physical and Chemical Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Fire in the Earth System: Introduction to the Special Collection

et al. 2023

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Fire has always been an important component of many ecosystems, but anthropogenic global climate change is now altering fire regimes over much of Earth's land surface, spurring a more urgent need to understand the physical, biological, and chemical processes associated with fire as well as its effects on human societies. In 2020, AGU launched a Special Collection that spanned 10 journals, soliciting papers under the theme “Fire in the Earth System” to encourage state‐of‐the‐art publications in fire‐related science. The completed Special Collection comprises more than 100 papers. Here, we summarize the articles published in this collection, considering them to be grouped into seven themes: paleofire and its ties to climate; evolution of fire patterns in the recent past and the future, including the effects of ongoing climate change; physical (atmospheric) and chemical processes associated with fire; ecosystem effects, including on biogeochemical cycles; physical landscape change after fire and its associated hazards; fire effects on water quality, air quality, and human health; and new methods and technologies applied to fire research.

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Section: How Does Fire Work? Physical and Chemical Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: How Does Fire Work? Physical and Chemical Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fire in the Earth System: Introduction to the Special Collection

et al. 2023

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“…3 ) are also the major causes behind acid deposition, a process that can have detrimental ecosystem effects such as decreased aquatic biodiversity, calcium depletion from soils, release of toxic aluminum (Gorham, 1998;Likens et al, 1998;Driscoll et al, 2001;Menz and Seip, 2004) and deterioration of building materials (Xie et al, 2004;Bravo et al, 2006). These growing societal and environmental problems helped influence and shape amendments to the Clean Air Act in the 1990s focusing on the criteria air pollutants SO 2 and NO x .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Long-term monitoring of cloud water chemistry at Whiteface Mountain: the emergence of a new chemical regime

et al. 2023

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Abstract. Atmospheric aqueous chemistry can have profound effects on our environment. The importance of chemistry within the atmospheric aqueous phase started gaining widespread attention in the 1970s as there was growing concern over the negative impacts on ecosystem health from acid deposition. Research at mountaintop observatories including Whiteface Mountain (WFM) showed that gas phase sulfur dioxide emissions react in cloud droplets to form sulfuric acid, which also impacted air quality by increasing aerosol mass loadings. The current study updates the long-term trends in cloud water composition at WFM for the period 1994–2021, with special consideration given to samples that have traditionally been excluded from analysis due to inorganic charge imbalance. We emphasize three major findings: (1) a growing abundance of total organic carbon (TOC), with annual median concentrations more than doubling since measurements began in 2009, (2) a growing imbalance between the measured inorganic cations and anions, consistent with independent rain water observations, implying that a substantial fraction of anions are no longer being measured with the historical suite of measurements, and (3) a growing number of samples exhibiting greater ammonium concentrations than sulfate plus nitrate concentrations, which now routinely describes over one-third of samples. Organic acids are identified as the most likely candidates for the missing anions, since the measured inorganic ion imbalance correlates strongly with measured TOC concentrations. An “inferred cloud droplet pH” is introduced to estimate the pH of the vast majority of cloud droplets as they reside in the atmosphere using a simple method to account for the expected mixing state of calcium and magnesium containing particles. While the inferred cloud droplet pH closely matches the measured bulk cloud water pH during the early years of the cloud water monitoring program, a growing discrepancy is found over the latter half of the record. We interpret these observations as indicating a growing fraction of cloud droplet acidity that is no longer accounted for by the measured sulfate, nitrate and ammonium concentrations. Altogether, these observations indicate that the chemical system at WFM has shifted away from a system dominated by sulfate to a system controlled by base cations, reactive nitrogen species and organic compounds. Further research is required to understand the effects on air quality, climate and ecosystem health.

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