Atmospheric Chemistry Research

Aims :

• Quantify the export and chemical evolution of radiatively and chemically important trace gases and aerosols from Europe to the eastern Mediterranean
• Quantify the impact of the European pollution on the eastern Mediterranean
• Elucidate mechanisms and pathways associated with the transport and transformation of these trace chemicals
• Characterise the air masses entering Greece and the eastern Mediterranean
• Comparison of measured chemical fields from airborne experiments with those predicted by the model
• Focus on ozone precursors and
• Quantify links between future air quality and climate
  

• GEOS-CHEM as chemistry transport model from Harvard University, in collaboration with Athens University.
• MINOS (Mediterranean Intensive Oxidant Study) campaign for measurements
• Simulations and runs by switching off regionally emissions
• Nesting of the global GEOS-CHEM model to 1x1 resolution

  
  

Output example:

Ozone concentration from assimilated Geos-Chem model in the upper troposphere (8.7 km) for January and July of 2001.

Climate Change and Impact Studies

Current activities :

• Extraction of climate extremes for analysis
• Time series of extremes under climate change
• Spatial paterns of extremes under climate change
• Quantitative modelling of impacts of changes in climate extremes on activiy sectors
• Expert-judgement based approaches to understanding impacts of changes in climate extremes on activity sectors

Examples of Extremes used for Impact Sector Analysis :

Impact Category	Climate Extreme	Parent Variable
(a) Forestry Wind throw Forest fire Ecological damage	Wind storm Heat stress, drought Flood, drought, heat stress	Storm tracking Temperature, rainfall
(b) Mediterranean Agriculture	Heat stress, Drought	Temperature, Rainfall
(c) Energy Use	Summer heat waves	Temperature
(d) Tourism	Heat stress, deficit or excess of snow	Temperature, Precipitation
(e) Insurance/Civil Protection Property damage Loss of life	Wind storm Floods	Storm tracking Rainfall, snow

 

Number of weeks (per year) with fire risk (FWI > 15): variation between 1960-1990 and 2030-2060 averages, according to the HadCM3 simulations.

Future directions:

• Use output from a wide selection of climate models (global and regional) to an objective probalistic estimate of uncertainty in future climate at the seasonal, decadal and longer timescales
• link the outputs to a range of applications, including agriculture, health, food security, energy, water resources, insurance and risk management
• produce estimates of future air quality using climate model output to drive our chemistry transport model GEOS-CHEM
  

 

Publications

<in development>

Funding

• EU projects such as MICE (Modelling the Impacts of Climate Extremes), ENSEMBLES (ensemble-based predictions of climate changes and their impacts), DeSurvey (a surveillance system for assessing and monitoring of desertification)

• National projects such as bilateral collaboration with Harvard University on Eastern Mediterranean pollution origin and distribution (GSRT)

• International collaboration such as: MINOS (led by Max Planck Institute), WWF 2C global warming impacts in the Mediterranean region (PDF report)
  

Contact

Dr. C. Giannakopoulos	+30 210 810 9138	cgiannak@meteo.noa.gr
Dr. E. Kostopoulou	+30 210 810 9151	ekosto@meteo.noa.gr
Dr. P. Le Sager	+30 210 810 9151	plesager@meteo.noa.gr
Dr. B. Psiloglou	+30 210 810 9133	bill@meteo.noa.gr
Fax	+30 210 8103236