ARL Weekly News – January 15, 2021

Recent Events

Economic Shutdown Impacts on Ozone Pollution presented to NOAA Senior Managers.

Patrick Campbell presented to NOAA OAR senior managers on Jan 11, 2021 on ARL research on COVID-19  impacts to Ozone and pollution. Despite widespread reductions in automobile traffic throughout most of the United States in spring 2020, ozone levels predominantly increased near major cities during the COVID-19 lockdown. However, changes were disproportionate across different U.S. regions due to shifting emissions and other factors. This work is supported by a number of ARL researchers, including, but not limited to: Daniel Tong, Youhua Tang, Barry Baker,  Pius Lee, Rick Saylor, and Ariel Stein.

Upcoming Events

ARL resumes aircraft flights to measure GHG emissions in Baltimore-Washington area

In collaboration with his colleagues from University of Maryland, NIST, Stony Brook University, and Purdue University, ARL’s Xinrong Ren will be involved in some research flights in late January to investigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the Baltimore-Washington area. The University Research Foundation’s Cessna 402B research aircraft and Purdue University’s Duchess will be flying over this area to measure carbon dioxide, methane, meteorological variables, and other trace gases as early as Jan 27, weather dependent.

Top-down GHGs emissions will be estimated based on the mass balance approach and will be compared to the emission inventories. The aircraft data will also be used for inverse modeling. This research provides decision makers with relevant science to aid in improved quantification of anthropogenic GHG emissions through direct analysis of ambient measurements and model simulations.