The anthropogenic influence on carbonaceous aerosol in the European background

Author(s)

Barbara May, Dietmar Wagenbach, Samuel Hammer, Peter Steier, Hans Puxbaum, Casimiro Pio

Abstract

To constrain the relatively uncertain anthropogenic impact on the organic aerosol load, radiocarbon analyses were performed on aerosol samples, collected year-round, at six non-urban sites including a maritime background and three remote mountain stations, lying on a west-east transect over Western Europe. From a crude three component model supported by TOC and levoglucosan filter data, the fossil fuel, biomass burning and biogenic TOC fraction are estimated, showing at all stations year-round, a relatively constant fossil fuel fraction of around (26 +/- 6)%, a dominant biogenic contribution of on average (73 +/- 7)% in summer and the continental as well as the maritime background TOC to be only about 50% biogenic. Assuming biomass burning as completely anthropogenic, the carbonaceous aerosol concentration at the mountain sites was found to have increased by a factor of up to (1.4 +/- 0.2) in summer and up to (2.5 +/- 1.0) in winter. This figure is significantly lower, however, than the respective TOC change since pre-industrial times seen in an Alpine ice core. Reconciling both observations would require an increase, since pre-industrial times, of the background biogenic aerosol load, which is estimated at a factor of 1.3-1.7.

Organisation(s)

Isotope Physics

External organisation(s)

Scientific Software Center, Technische Universität Wien, University of Aveiro

Journal

Tellus. Series B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology

Volume

61

Pages

464-472

No. of pages

9

ISSN

0280-6509

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0889.2008.00379.x

Publication date

2009

Peer reviewed

Yes

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

105904 Environmental research

Portal url

https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/03562cf8-6a58-48c9-8fc3-4e3d237b4e4e