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Anomalous low tropospheric column ozone over Eastern India during the severe drought event of monsoon 2002: a case study

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Abstract

Background, aim, and scope

The present study is an attempt to examine some of the probable causes of the unusually low tropospheric column ozone observed over eastern India during the exceptional drought event in July 2002.

Method

We examined horizontal wind and omega (vertical velocity) anomalies over the Indian region to understand the large-scale dynamical processes which prevailed in July 2002. We also examined anomalies in tropospheric carbon monoxide (CO), an important ozone precursor, and observed low CO mixing ratio in the free troposphere in 2002 over eastern India.

Results and discussion

It was found that instead of a normal large-scale ascent, the air was descending in the middle and lower troposphere over a vast part of India. This configuration was apparently responsible for the less convective upwelling of precursors and likely caused less photochemical ozone formation in the free troposphere over eastern India in July 2002.

Conclusion

The insight gained from this case study will hopefully provide a better understanding of the process controlling the distribution of the tropospheric ozone over the Indian region.

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Acknowledgment

The authors are thankful to Prof. B.N. Goswami, Director, IITM, for encouragement during the progress of the work. MOPITT CO data were obtained from the NASA Langley Research Center Atmospheric Science Data Center. One of the authors (PSK) is financed through the “SPATRAM-MIGE Polar Project,” funded by the Portuguese Science Foundation—FCT. We thank to National Centers for Environmental Prediction/National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCEP-NCAR) reanalysis (http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/) for providing wind reanalysis data. The TRMM 3b42 data products used in this study were acquired using the GES-DISC Interactive Online Visualization and analysis Infrastructure (Giovanni) as part of the NASA's Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Data and Information Services Center (DISC). We acknowledge the atmospheric science data center, NASA, for providing TES data and we are grateful to NASA (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer, http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/) for supplying MODIS water vapor products.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune, 411008, India

    Sachin D. Ghude, Santosh H. Kulkarni, Suvarna Fadnavis, Samir Pokhrel, Chinmay Jena & G. Beig

  2. Geophysics Centre of Evora (CGE), University of Évora, Évora, Portugal

    Pavan S. Kulkarni & D. Bortoli

  3. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Kent State University, Kent, OH, 44242, USA

    Vijay P. Kanawade

Authors
  1. Sachin D. Ghude
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  2. Santosh H. Kulkarni
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  4. Vijay P. Kanawade
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  5. Suvarna Fadnavis
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  6. Samir Pokhrel
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  7. Chinmay Jena
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  8. G. Beig
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  9. D. Bortoli
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Correspondence to Sachin D. Ghude.

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Responsible editor: Euripides Stephanou

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Ghude, S.D., Kulkarni, S.H., Kulkarni, P.S. et al. Anomalous low tropospheric column ozone over Eastern India during the severe drought event of monsoon 2002: a case study. Environ Sci Pollut Res 18, 1442–1455 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-011-0506-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-011-0506-4

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