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Dust in Iceland and Antarctica

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Dust in Iceland and Antarctica NEW HIGH LATITUDE DUST SOURCES AND PATHWAYS: DUST IN ICELAND AND ANTARCTICA PAVLA DAGSSON WALDHAUSEROVA O. ARNALDS, H. OLAFSSON, O. MEINANDER, J-B RENARD, J. HLADIL, L. CHADIMOVA, J. KAVAN, B. MORONI, AND MORE WORKSHOP ON EFFECTS AND EXTREMES OF HIGH LATITUDE DUST KELDNAHOLT, ICELAND, 13-14 FEB 2019 April 2017 OUTLINE • HIGH LATITUDE DUST SOURCES (HLD) • ICELAND AS A MAIN CONTRIBUTOR OF HLD AREAS • LONG-RANGE TRANSPORT OF ICELANDIC DUST • DUST IMPACTS ON OTHER EARTH SYSTEMS • DUST STORMS IN THE ANTARCTIC PENINSULA IN 2018 • ICELANDIC AEROSOL AND DUST ASSOCIATION (ICEDUST) AND RELATED ACTIVITIES HIGH LATITUDE DUST AREAS Ittoqqortoomiit, September 2018 Source: NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey HIGH LATITUDE DUST AREAS – N EURASIA ICELAND AND SOURCES OF AIR POLLUTION (PM) • TOTAL ICELANDIC DESERT AREAS COVER OVER 44,000 KM2 • ICELAND IS THE LARGEST ARCTIC AS WELL AS EUROPEAN DESERT •> 40 % OF ICELAND IS CLASSIFIED WITH CONSIDERABLE TO VERY SEVERE EROSION WHAT MAKES ICELANDIC DUST SOURCES SO ACTIVE? • FREQUENT VOLCANIC ERUPTIONS (+GLACIAL OUTBURST FLOODS “JÖKULHLAUP”) • FREQUENT STRONG WINDS Arnalds et al., 2016 DESERT AREA with high erosion rates marked orange and red! volcanic sandy deserts (22% of Iceland) glacial riverbeds and ice-proximal areas = “dust hot spots” Source: GRID-Arendal, 2005. Barentswatch Atlas. ICELAND – NATURAL OR ANTHROPOGENIC DESERT? • 800 YEARS AGO: DESERT AREAS WERE VEGETATED AND AT LEAST 25% OF THE COUNTRY WAS A FOREST • 100 YEARS AGO: WOODLANDS WERE REDUCED DUE TO MEDIEVAL AGRICULTURAL METHODS TO ALMOST TOTAL ELIMINATION • COLD CLIMATE AND MASSIVE EROSION CAUSED A COLLAPSE TURNING VEGETATED ECOSYSTEM INTO DESERT TODAY • ICELAND EXPERIENCES >130 DUST DAYS • ANNUALLY AFFECTING THE AREA OF > 500,000 KM2 Rofabard (erosion escarpment) – relic of fertile soils HOW MUCH DUST IS EMITTED FROM ICELAND? 5 t km-2 500 t km-2 • TOTAL EMISSIONS: 4.3 ± 0.8 TG • TOTAL EMISSIONS: 30.5 TO 40.1 MILLION T LONG-RANGE TRANSPORT OF DUST Where does the Icelandic dust travel? • Ocean deposition was on average 2.5 Tg or 58% of annually emitted dust • Smaller fractions of emitted dust ended up in Greenland (2 %) and Svalbard • (< 0,1 %) • About 7% of emitted dust is deposited in the high Arctic (> 80° N) • Europe deposition (3% of emitted dust) LONG-RANGE TRANSPORT OF DUST Where do the air parcels travel from Iceland? Here is a study from 1992-2012. LEFT COLUMN – All forward trajectories from two weather stations in Iceland RIGHT COLUMN – Dust observation forward trajectories from two weather stations in Iceland Only SYNOP dust code 6 was used – not really massive dust storms IS THERE ANY EVIDENCE THAT ICELANDIC DUST HAS REACHED SVALBARD OR EUROPE? PM10 low and medium- volume samplers in Ny- Ålesund, Svalbard since 2011 The metal oxide particles as the most representative mineralogical/phase markers for Iceland dust sources. Magnetite-chromite and the magnetite-ülvospinel associations as marker facies of the tholeiitic magmatic series and volcanic glass as a further indicator of provenance from Iceland. Faroe Mace Head Ireland Belgrade 2012-2013 Sep 2011 DUST FRONT ABOVE HVERAGERÐI, JUNE 15, 2015 Some examples of dust storms in Iceland REYKJAVÍK HAZE, SEPTEMBER 11, 2011 HVALFJÖRÐUR DUST, MARCH 24, 2012 AGRICULTURAL UNIVERSITY OF ICELAND CAMERA MONITORING SYSTEM – 3 MOST ACTIVE DESERTS DUST EVENT IMPACTS ON OTHER SYSTEMS 1. Extreme wind erosion event of 2. Snow-Dust Storm 3. Suspended dust during moist Eyjafjallajökull volcanic ash and low wind conditions September 14-15th, 2010 August 12th, 2013 Direct impacts of dust on other systems than cryosphere SHM, Report NI 13003, 2013. Fe concentrations in mosses Unique bird and volcanic dust datasets indicate fertility associated with basaltic volcanic ash Dust storms in the Antarctic peninsula in 2018 AIR BORNE MEASUREMENTS WITH LOAC 2013/2016 (LIGHT OPTICAL AEROSOL COUNTER) © RAX Mean (median) mass concentrations: −3 PM10 were 6.4 ± 1.4 (3.9 ± 1) μgm −3 PM2,5 were 3.1 ± 1 (2.3 ± 0.9) μgm for the period January-March 2018 - No long term measurements for PM>1μm - Patagonian dust detection - Mission Ant. summer 2019 looks bad - Get ready for mission 2020 Can we see the Patagonian dust in our Antarctic data? Patagonia very active in dust production, Tierra del Fuego ICEDUST or HLD Workshops HTTPS://ICEDUSTBLOG.WORDPRESS.COM/ CONCLUSIONS • HIGH LATITUDE DUST AFFECTS LARGE AREAS – NEW SOURCES IDENTIFICATION • ICELANDIC DUST CAN TRAVEL LONG DISTANCES (> 2,500 KM) −3 • HOURLY PM10 LEVELS IN ANTARCTICA CAN EXCEED 50 μgm • WHAT IS THE SITUATION WITH DUST STORMS IN CENTRAL EUROPE? Dust storms in Czech Republic in 2018 > 10 dust days [email protected] Thank you for your attention! [email protected] Road administration cameras – Visibility 0 km.
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