Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 4439–4449, 2016 www.atmos-chem-phys.net/16/4439/2016/ doi:10.5194/acp-16-4439-2016 © Author(s) 2016. CC Attribution 3.0 License. 12 13 Kinetic isotope effects of CH3D C OH and CH3D C OH from 278 to 313 K L. M. T. Joelsson1,3, J. A. Schmidt1, E. J. K. Nilsson2, T. Blunier3, D. W. T. Griffith4, S. Ono5, and M. S. Johnson1 1Department of Chemistry, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark 2Division of Combustion Physics, Department of Physics, Lund University, Lund, Sweden 3Centre for Ice and Climate (CIC), Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark 4University of Wollongong, Department of Chemistry, Wollongong, Australia 5Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA Correspondence to: M. S. Johnson (
[email protected]) Received: 16 September 2015 – Published in Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss.: 15 October 2015 Revised: 2 March 2016 – Accepted: 16 March 2016 – Published: 11 April 2016 Abstract. Methane is the second most important long-lived source signal with relatively small adjustment due to the sink greenhouse gas and plays a central role in the chemistry signal (i.e., mainly OH oxidation). of the Earth’s atmosphere. Nonetheless there are signifi- cant uncertainties in its source budget. Analysis of the iso- topic composition of atmospheric methane, including the 13 doubly substituted species CH3D, offers new insight into 1 Introduction the methane budget as the sources and sinks have dis- tinct isotopic signatures. The most important sink of at- Atmospheric methane is the subject of increasing interest mospheric methane is oxidation by OH in the troposphere, from both the climate research community and the pub- which accounts for around 84 % of all methane removal.