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The balance of effects of deep convective mixing on tropospheric ozone
Author(s) -
Lawrence Mark G.,
von Kuhlmann Rolf,
Salzmann Marc,
Rasch Philip J.
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2003gl017644
Subject(s) - troposphere , convection , convective mixing , environmental science , ozone , atmospheric sciences , mixing (physics) , mixing ratio , deep convection , chemical transport model , meteorology , geology , physics , quantum mechanics
The balance of effects that vertical transport associated with deep cumulus convection has on tropospheric O 3 is discussed. We first show theoretically that convective mixing of O 3 can substantially reduce its column mean lifetime over clean regions, while a much smaller increase is generally expected over polluted regions. The global chemistry‐transport model MATCH‐MPIC confirms this, computing a 6% decrease in the annual mean tropospheric O 3 burden and a 7% decrease in its lifetime due to convective transport of O 3 alone. We find, however, that the net effect of convective transport of all trace gases (O 3 and precursors together) is a 12% increase in the tropospheric O 3 burden. Thus, in contrast to previous literature, our results indicate that the enhanced O 3 production due to precursor transport from polluted regions significantly outweighs the reduction in O 3 lifetime due to mixing over clean regions.