Mesoscale modeling of smoke transport over the Southeast Asian Maritime Continent: coupling of smoke direct radiative feedbacks below and above the low-level clouds
Authors: Ge C. , Wang J. , Reid J. S. 
Published: June 2013

Abstract. The online-coupled Weather Research and Forecasting model with Chemistry (WRF-Chem) is used to simulate the direct and semi-direct radiative impacts of smoke particles over the Southeast Asian Marine Continents (MC, 10° S–10° N, 90° E–150° E) during October 2006 when a significant El Nino event caused the highest biomass burning activity since 1997. With the use of OC (Organic Carbon)/BC (Black Carbon) ratio of 10 in the smoke emission inventory, the baseline simulation shows that the low-level clouds amplifying effect on smoke absorption led to a warming effect at the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) with a domain/monthly average forcing value of ~20 W m−2 over the islands of Borneo and Sumatra. The smoke-induced monthly average daytime heating (0.3 K) that is largely confined above the low-level clouds results in the local convergence over the smoke source region. This heating-induced convergence coupled with daytime planetary boundary layer turbulent mixing, transports more smoke particles above the planetary boundary layer height (PBLH), hence rendering a positive feedback. This positive feedback contrasts with the decrease of cloud fraction resulted from the combined effects of smoke heating within the cloud layer and the more stability in the boundary layer; the latter can be considered as a negative feedback in which decrease of cloud fraction weakens the heating by smoke particles above the clouds. During nighttime, the elevated smoke layer (above clouds in daytime) is decoupled from boundary layer, and the reduction of PBLH due to the residual surface cooling from the daytime lead to the accumulation of smoke particles near the surface. Because of smoke radiative extinction, on monthly basis, the amount of the solar input at the surface is reduced as large as 60 W m−2, which lead to the decrease of sensible heat, latent heat, 2 m air temperature, and PBLH by a maximum of 20 W m−2, 20 W m−2, 1 K, 120 m, respectively. The decrease of boundary layer mixing and the generation of convergence above the PBL also results in a reduction of precipitable water 1–2 km above the PBLH and more precipitable water near the surface and in upper part of the middle troposphere with changes around 0.1 mm. Overall, there is less of a change of column water vapor over the land, and an increase of water vapor amount over the Karimata Strait. The cloud changes over continents are mostly occurred over the islands of Sumatra and Borneo during the daytime, where the low-level cloud fraction decreases more than 10%. However, the change of local wind (include sea breeze) induced by the smoke radiative feedback leads to more convergence over Karimata Strait and south coastal area of Kalimantan during both daytime and night time; consequently, cloud fraction is increased there up to 20%. The sensitivities with different OC/BC ratio show the importance of the smoke single scattering albedo for the smoke semi-direct effects. A case study on 31 October 2006 further demonstrated a much larger (more than twice of the monthly average) feedback induced by smoke aerosols. The decreased sea breeze during big events can lead to prominent increase (40%) of low-level cloud over coastal water. Lastly, the direct and semi-direct radiative impact of smoke particles over the Southeast Asian Marine Continents is summarized as a conceptual model.