Sorry, you need to enable JavaScript to visit this website.

Mercury in precipitated and surface snow at Dome C and a first estimate of mercury depositional fluxes during the Austral summer on the high Antarctic plateau

TitoloMercury in precipitated and surface snow at Dome C and a first estimate of mercury depositional fluxes during the Austral summer on the high Antarctic plateau
Tipo di pubblicazioneArticolo su Rivista peer-reviewed
Anno di Pubblicazione2021
AutoriCairns, W.R., Turetta C., Maffezzoli N., Magand O., Araujo B.F., Angot H., Segato D., Cristofanelli P., Sprovieri F., Scarchilli Claudio, Grigioni P., Ciardini Virginia, Barbante C., Dommergue A., and Spolaor A.
RivistaAtmospheric Environment
Volume262
Parole chiaveambient air, Antarctic plateau, antarctica, Atmospheric conditions, Austral summers, boundary layer, Boundary layers, Deposition fluxes, Deposition rates, Depositional fluxes, Dome Concordia, Domes, East Antarctica, High resolution sampling, mercury (element), Mercury (metal), Regression, scavenging (chemistry), Snow, snow accumulation, Snow scavenging factor, Snow sublimation, snowpack, Surface snow, wet deposition
Abstract

The role of deposition fluxes on the mercury cycle at Concordia station, on the high Antarctic plateau have been investigated over the Austral summer between December 2017 to January 2018. Wet/frozen deposition was collected daily from specially sited tables, simultaneously with the collection of surface (0–3 cm) and subsurface (3–6 cm) snow and the analysis of Hg0 in the ambient air. Over the course of the experiment the atmospheric Hg0 concentrations ranged from 0.58 ± 0.19 to 1.00 ± 0.33 ng m−3, surface snow Hg concentrations varied between (0–3 cm) 0.006 ± 0.003 to 0.001 ± 0.001 ng cm−3 and subsurface snow (3–6 cm) concentrations varied between 0.001 ± 0.001 to 0.003 ± 0.002 ng cm−3. The maximum daily wet deposition flux was found to be 23 ng m−2 d−1. Despite the low temporal resolution of our measurements combined with their potential errors, the linear regression of the Hg deposition fluxes against the snow accumulation rates allowed us to estimate the mean dry deposition rate from the intercept of the graph as −0.005 +- 0.008 ng m−2 d−1. From this analysis, we conclude that wet deposition accounts for the vast majority of the Hg deposition fluxes at Concordia Station. The number of snow events, together with the continuous GEM measurements have allowed us to make a first estimation of the mean snow scavenging factor at Dome C. Using the slope of the regression of mercury flux on snow accumulation we obtained a snow scavenging factor that ranges from 0.21 to 0.22 ± 0.02 (ngHg/g snow)/(ngHg/m3air). Our data indicate that the boundary layer height and local meteorological effects influence Hg0 reemission from the top of (0–3 cm) the snowpack into the atmosphere and into the deeper snowpack layer (3–6 cm). These data will help constrain numerical models on the behaviour of mercury in Antarctica. © 2021 Elsevier Ltd

Note

cited By 0

URLhttps://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85111242796&doi=10.1016%2fj.atmosenv.2021.118634&partnerID=40&md5=6254b34126989be4d0149b8cff2b9187
DOI10.1016/j.atmosenv.2021.118634
Citation KeyCairns2021