An emission source inversion model based on satellite data and its application in air quality forecasts

This paper aims at constructing an emission source inversion model using a variational processing method and adaptive nudging scheme for the Community Multiscale Air Quality Model (CMAQ) based on satellite data to investigate the applicability of high resolution OMI (Ozone Monitoring Instrument) column concentration data for air quality forecasts over the North China. The results show a reasonable consistency and good correlation between the spatial distributions of NO2 from surface and OMI satellite measurements in both winter and summer. Such OMI products may be used to implement integrated variational analysis based on observation data on the ground. With linear and variational corrections made, the spatial distribution of OMI NO2 clearly revealed more localized distributing characteristics of NO2 concentration. With such information, emission sources in the southwest and southeast of North China are found to have greater impacts on air quality in Beijing. When the retrieved emission source inventory based on high-resolution OMI NO2 data was used, the coupled Weather Research Forecasting CMAQ model (WRF-CMAQ) performed significantly better in forecasting NO2 concentration level and its tendency as reflected by the more consistencies between the NO2 concentrations from surface observation and model result. In conclusion, satellite data are particularly important for simulating NO2 concentrations on urban and street-block scale. High-resolution OMI NO2 data are applicable for inversing NO (x) emission source inventory, assessing the regional pollution status and pollution control strategy, and improving the model forecasting results on urban scale.