Tropospheric ozone is a pollutant which is responsible for forest damage worldwide.
It is a potent oxidant which invades foliage through stomatal pores and impairs normal physiological function. Currently, there exist extensive ozone monitoring networks which measure ozone concentrations in remote forested locations throughout the US and Europe, however the physiologically relevant measure of potential ozone effects on forest health is the ozone flux, the amount of ozone which actually enters the foliage. We propose a method of utilizing routinely-measured meteorology to model ozone flux from ozone concentrations. From our eddy flux work in a ponderosa pine stand, we have observed that peak ozone flux occurs in the early summer, while peak ozone concentrations occur in the late summer. Daily peak ozone flux precedes peak ozone concentrations by 2-4 hours.