Concept information
Preferred term
INCATPA
Definition
- Anthropogenic pollutants such as persistent organic pollutants (POPs), other semivolatile organic pollutants (SOCs) and mercury can be transported over long distances from source regions to the remote Arctic. Since the Arctic does not exist alone and it shares a common atmosphere and aqua-sphere with the World, these pollutants can theoretically originate from anywhere globally and be carried to the Arctic by air and ocean currents. Studies conducted under the Northern Contaminants Program (NCP), the Canadian National Implementation Plan of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP), as well as others, have associated episodes of high POP concentrations measured on the western North American Arctic with atmospheric transport across the Pacific from potential sources in Asia. Such transport can occur in as short as 5 to 10 days. These pollutants have the tendency of depositing on terrestrial and aquatic surfaces in the Arctic and can bioaccumulate through the Arctic foodchain. Deposition of this kind has been assessed by the Western Airborne Contaminants Assessment Project (WACAP) in National Parks along the U.S. and Alaskan Pacific coasts. Due to their environmental persistence and potential toxicity, these pollutants can significantly affect the health of Arctic wildlife and human. The current project aims at advancing our knowledge in the factors and mechanisms which influence intercontinental transport of pollutants and our understanding of the relative contribution of intercontinental versus intracontinental transport to the Arctic. These objectives can be achieved through coordinated source-receptor measurement of atmospheric pollutants coupled with multi-media transport modelling. It is proposed that simultaneous air sampling for mercury, POPs (e.g. chlordanes, DDTs, dieldrin, hexachlorocyclohexanes [HCHs], toxaphene, polychlorinated biphenyls [PCBs]) and other anthropogenic chemicals (e.g. endosulfan, polybrominated flame retardants, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons [PAHs] and current-use pesticides) be conducted along both sides of the Pacific Ocean. These sampling sites include locations in northern China, Vietnam, Japan, eastern Russian Arctic and sub-Arctic, the western Canadian Arctic, Alaska and the west coast of the U.S.A.. Both conventional high volume air sampling (Hivol) and passive air sampling (PAS) methods (in cooperation with the Global Atmospheric Passive Sampling (GAPS) Project and Chinese POPs Air Monitoring Program) for POPs will be used to obtain air samples integrating over different time scales, ranging from 1-2 days (Hivol) to several months to a year (PAS). This allows the assessment of event-based transport episodes versus the overall impact averaged over seasons and years. This will also facilitate the development of PAS which are low cost and require little maintenance. For ambient air mercury measurements all sample analysis will be performed using the Automated Tekran Mercury Vapour Analyser as used in AMAP and NCP sampling sites. A coupled global-scale three-dimensional atmospheric transport and air / soil exchange model developed to investigate the transport of POPs (MEDIA) and the Global/Regional Atmospheric Heavy Metals Model (GRAHM) will be used to forecast trans-Pacific and intracontinental transport episodes of POPs and mercury to facilitate sampling, interpret air monitoring results and estimate the effect of climate change on the long-range transport of pollutants to the Arctic. This project will make use of existing air monitoring facilities for POPs established under AMAP, North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) China-Canada Joint Project on Reduction of Lindane Usage in China and its Impact Globally and on North America, as well as other national and university-based studies in Asia and North America. The new site of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy will be initiated in the Eastern Russian sub-Arctic to increase spatial coverage of measurements. Research will focus on: (1) fingerprinting chemical compositions of air masses from different parts of the Pacific; (2) identifying key chemical properties, e.g. vapour pressures and air-surface partition coefficients, and atmospheric dynamics, e.g. large-scale wind systems, pressure and geopotential heights, air temperatures, precipitation etc., which dictates chemical transport to the Arctic; (3) quantifying the relative contribution and major pathways of intercontinental versus intracontinental input of pollutants into the North American Arctic; and establishing background atmospheric circulation patterns for episodic trans-Pacific pollutant transport to the Arctic; (4) assessing and forecasting the potential influence of changes in atmospheric circulation patterns and climate variability on the long-range transport of pollutants to the Arctic. All Arctic sites involved in this study will also be part of the IPY Core Activities of ATMOPOL ( #76) and COPOL (#175). Results from this project can be linked to the IPY EOI of TRANSARC Pollutants (#50) and other EOIs. Summary provided by http://classic.ipy.org/development/eoi/proposal-details.php?id=327 (en)
Broader concept
- G - I (en)
URI
https://gcmd.earthdata.nasa.gov/kms/concept/ace64898-5f6b-499e-83ef-6256200553b4
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