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Ground-based observation of lightning-induced nitrogen oxides at a mountaintop in free troposphere

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Abstract

Lightning is an important source of nitrogen oxides (LNOx). The actual global production of LNOx is still largely uncertain. One of the reasons for this uncertainty is the limited available observation data. We measured the concentrations of total reactive nitrogen (NOy), nitric oxide (NO) and nitrogen dioxides (NO2) and then obtained NOx oxidation products (NOz: NOz = NOy - NOx) at a station at the top of Mount Fuji (3776 m a.s.l.) during the summer of 2017. Increases in NOy and NO2 were observed on 22 August 2017. These peaks were unaccompanied by increases in CO, which suggested that the observed air mass did not contain emissions from combustion. The backward trajectories of the above air mass indicated that it moved across areas where lightning occurred. The NOy concentration was also calculated by using a chemical transport model, which did not take NOx produced by lightning into account. Therefore, the NOy concentration due to lightning can be inferred by subtracting the calculated NOy from the observed NOy concentrations. The concentration of NOy at 13:00 on 22 August 2017 originating from lightning was estimated to be 1.11 ± 0.02 ppbv, which comprised 97 ± 2% of the total NOy concentration. The fractions of NO2 and NOz in the total NOy were 0.54 ± 0.01 and 0.46 ± 0.03, respectively. The NO concentration was below the detection limit. We firstly observed increase of concentrations of NOy originating from lightning by ground-based observation and demonstrated the quantitative estimates of LNOx using model-based calculation.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKENHI 16 K00520) and the Ichimura Foundation for new Technology. The authors wish to thank the World Wide Lightning Location Network (http://wwlln.net), collaboration among over 50 universities and institutions, for providing the lightning location data used in this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Natural and Environmental Science, Teikyo University of Science, Yamanashi, 409-0193, Japan

    Ryuichi Wada

  2. Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka Prefecture University, Osaka, 599-8531, Japan

    Y. Sadanaga

  3. Faculty of Urban Environmental Sciences, Tokyo Metropolitan University, Tokyo, 192-0397, Japan

    S. Kato

  4. Department of Bioresources and Environmental Sciences, Ishikawa Prefectural University, Ishikawa, 921-8836, Japan

    N. Katsumi

  5. Department of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Waseda University, Tokyo, 169-8555, Japan

    H. Okochi

  6. Graduate School of Biosphere Science, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, 739-8511, Japan

    Y. Iwamoto

  7. Department of Physics, Tokyo University of Science, Tokyo, 162-8601, Japan

    K. Miura

  8. Graduate Faculty of Interdisciplinary Research, Graduate School, University of Yamanashi, Yamanashi, 400-8510, Japan

    H. Kobayashi

  9. Global Centre for Asian and Regional Research, University of Shizuoka, Shizuoka, 420-0839, Japan

    M. Kamogawa

  10. Department of Human Behavior and Environmental Science, Waseda University, Saitama, 359-1192, Japan

    J. Matsumoto

  11. National Agriculture and Food Research Organization, Institute for Agro-Environmental Sciences, Ibaraki, 305-8604, Japan

    S. Yonemura

  12. Institute for Space–Earth Environmental Research, Nagoya University, Nagoya, 464-8601, Japan

    Y. Matsumi

  13. Atmospheric Environment and Applied Meteorology Research Department, Meteorological Research Institute, Ibaraki, 305-0052, Japan

    M. Kajino

  14. Centre for Environmental Science in Saitama, Saitama, 347-0115, Japan

    S. Hatakeyama

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  1. Ryuichi Wada
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Wada, R., Sadanaga, Y., Kato, S. et al. Ground-based observation of lightning-induced nitrogen oxides at a mountaintop in free troposphere. J Atmos Chem 76, 133–150 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10874-019-09391-4

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