Quantifying influence of local air pollution on measurements in Ny-Ålesund and at the Zeppelin station

Abstract

In order to keep the scientific significance of the Ny-Ålesund station on Svalbard as the key place for the monitoring of background air it is needed to assess the influence from local human activities on the air quality. Whether research and tourist activity continues to grow or restrictions to be implied the change of impact may affect air chemistry data quality. Therefore the identification of the present sources of local, regional and long-range transport of pollution and estimation of the magnitude of their impact on the data collected at the mountain Zeppelin station and in the Ny-Ålesund village would be very useful for any proposal for the local activity change. The classical tools of the air pollution dispersion theory cannot be applied alone for such analysis and should be compiled with the knowledge of the local micrometeorological features and unique Arctic air chemistry and physics. Taking it into account the atmospheric stability analysis and local wind field assessment has been applied and the days with possible local pollution from the cruise ship traffic and from the power plant have been defined. Further the long-range sources of pollution have been determined using FLEXTRA air mass trajectories analysis. In general, the Zeppelin station is proved to be influenced by the local pollution quite rare if was at all and remains a valuable scientific station for the long-range transport research. However, the results of the analysis show that the high rate of uncertainty is still present in the separation of the long-range transport and local pollution due to the absence of the high frequency chemical measurements of the same tracer both in the village and at the Zeppelin station. It would be possible to investigate the influence of the regional pollution from the ships when the ship location statistics is available. On the other hand, the comprehensive local meteorological data analysis done for the area allows to set up a high resolution air dispersion model in the further work.