Ozone production chemistry in the presence of urban plumes

Ozone pollution affects human health, especially in urban areas on hot sunny days. Its basic photochemistry has been known for decades and yet it is still not possible to correctly predict the high ozone levels that are the greatest threat. The CalNex_SJV study in Bakersfield CA in May/June 2010 provided an opportunity to examine ozone photochemistry in an urban area surrounded by agriculture. The measurement suite included hydroxyl (OH), hydroperoxyl (HO₂), and OH reactivity, which are compared with the output of a photochemical box model. While the agreement is generally within combined uncertainties, measured HO₂ far exceeds modeled HO₂ in NO_x-rich plumes. OH production and loss do not balance as they should in the morning, and the ozone production calculated with measured HO₂ is a decade greater than that calculated with modeled HO₂ when NO levels are high. Calculated ozone production using measured HO₂ is twice that using modeled HO₂, but this difference in calculated ozone production has minimal impact on the assessment of NO_x-sensitivity or VOC-sensitivity for midday ozone production. Evidence from this study indicates that this important discrepancy is not due to the HO₂ measurement or to the sampling of transported plumes but instead to either emissions of unknown organic species that accompany the NO emissions or unknown photochemistry involving nitrogen oxides and hydrogen oxides, possibly the hypothesized reaction OH + NO + O₂ → HO₂ + NO₂.

Anion-catalyzed dissolution of NO2 on aqueous microdroplets

Fifty-seven years after NO(x) (NO + NO(2)) were identified as essential components of photochemical smog, atmospheric chemical models fail to correctly predict *OH/HO(2)* concentrations under NO(x)-rich conditions. This deficiency is due, in part, to the uncertain rates and mechanism for the reactive dissolution of NO(2)(g) (2NO(2) + H(2)O = NO(3)(-) + H(+) + HONO) in fog and aerosol droplets. Thus, state-of-the-art models parametrize the uptake of NO(2) by atmospheric aerosol from data obtained on "deactivated tunnel wall residue". Here, we report experiments in which NO(3)(-) production on the surface of microdroplets exposed to NO(2)(g) for approximately 1 ms is monitored by online thermospray mass spectrometry. NO(2) does not dissolve in deionized water (NO(3)(-) signals below the detection limit) but readily produces NO(3)(-) on aqueous NaX (X = Cl, Br, I) microdroplets with NO(2) uptake coefficients gamma that vary nonmonotonically with electrolyte concentration and peak at gamma(max) approximately 10(-4) for [NaX] approximately 1 mM, which is >10(3) larger than that in neat water. Since I(-) is partially oxidized to I(2)(*-) in this process, anions seem to capture NO(2)(g) into X-NO(2)(*-) radical anions for further reaction at the air/water interface. By showing that gamma is strongly enhanced by electrolytes, these results resolve outstanding discrepancies between previous measurements in neat water versus NaCl-seeded clouds. They also provide a general mechanism for the heterogeneous conversion of NO(2)(g) to (NO(3)(-) + HONO) on the surface of aqueous media.

Measurement of trace atmospheric species by chemical ionization mass spectrometry: speciation of reactive nitrogen and future directions

Chemical ionization mass spectrometry (CIMS) has proven to be a powerful method for sensitive, fast time response (t approximately 1 sec) measurements of various atmospheric compounds with limits of detection (LOD) of the order of tens of pptv and lower. The rapid time response of CIMS is particularly well suited for airborne measurements and its application has largely grown out of airborne measurements in the stratosphere and upper troposphere. This work reviews some of the advances in CIMS technology that have occurred in the past decade. In particular, CIMS methods for selective measurement of reactive nitrogen species (e.g., HNO3, HO2NO2, PAN, and NH3) in the lower atmosphere (altitudes approximately 0-8 km) are described. In addition, recent developments in CIMS technology for the selective measurement of gas-phase hydroperoxides and aerosol chemical composition are briefly described.

An improved dual channel PERCA instrument for atmospheric measurements of peroxy radicals

This paper describes a new dual-channel PEroxy RadiCal Amplification (PERCA) instrument, which has been designed to improve the time resolution and signal to noise and to reduce the interference caused by variations in ambient ozone concentrations. The instrument was run at the Weybourne Atmospheric Observatory (WAO), North Norfolk, during WAOWEX (Weybourne Atmospheric Observatory Winter Experiment) in January/February 2002 and INSPECTRO (Influence of clouds on the spectral actinic flux in the lower troposphere) in September 2002. The performance of the instrument is assessed and compared to that of a single channel instrument. In particular, it is shown how the precision is greatly improved in fluctuating background ozone conditions. In addition the improved time response of the instrument allows changes in peroxy radical concentrations to be related to rapid changes in nitric oxide concentrations and the ozone photolysis frequency, j(O(1)D).

An absolute calibration for gas-phase hydroxyl measurements

We describe a new method of calibrating tropospheric hydroxyl (OH) instruments. Ozone-alkene mixtures produce steady-state OH radical concentrations. The steady state is governed by competition between OH production in the reaction of ozone with the alkene and OH removal by reactions with the alkene, ozone, and the reactor wall. In a flowtube reactor transporting an ozone-alkene mixture, the OH wall loss rate can be measured by varying the alkene concentration. Delivery of the reaction mixture to the sampling entry of an atmospheric OH measurement instrument provides an absolute calibration of the instrument's response to OH. The present precision of calibration is +/-8% (1-sigma), based on reproducibility over a wide range of ozone concentrations. The accuracy (+/-43%) is limited by uncertainties in kinetic rate coefficients and OH yield, which can be improved. The calibration requires no photon flux measurements or lamp-dependent absorption coefficients, which have inherent, variable, systematic uncertainties, and it has been tested in field experiments.