Comment on “Isotopic evidence for dominant secondary production of HONO in near-ground wildfire plumes” by Chai et al. (2021)

Details

• Journal Title:
  Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
• Personal Author:
  Roberts, James M.
• NOAA Program & Office:
  OAR (Oceanic and Atmospheric Research) ; CSL (Chemical Sciences Laboratory) ; ESRL (Earth System Research Laboratory)
• Description:
  Chai et al. (2021) recently published measurements of wildfire-derived (WF) oxides of nitrogen (NOx) and nitrous acid (HONO) and their isotopic composition. The method used to sample NOx, collection in alkaline solution, has a known 1:1 interference from another reactive nitrogen compound, acetyl peroxynitrate (PAN). Although PAN is thermally unstable, subsequent reactions with nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in effect extend the lifetime of PAN many times longer than the initial decomposition reaction would indicate. This, coupled with the rapid and efficient formation of PAN in WF plumes, means the NOx measurements reported by Chai et al.​​​​​​​ were severely impacted by PAN. In addition, the model reactions in the original paper included neither the reactions of NO2 with hydroxyl radical (OH) to form nitric acid nor the efficient reaction of larger organic radicals with nitric oxide to form organic nitrates (RONO2).
• Source:
  Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 21(22), 16793-16795
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-16793-2021
• ISSN:
  1680-7324
• Format:
  pdf
• Publisher:
  Copernicus GmbH
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• License:
  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Rights Information:
  CC BY
• Compliance:
  Library
• Download URL:
  https://repository.library.noaa.gov/view/noaa/69725/noaa_69725_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 154.44 KB]
• Collection(s):
  Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR)
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:243081f73a8e01a026d430dcbb7570cbe5c7ea72e48f816fa40f3f04f6bc713991b0eeb0b91058fd0af723878c348992462a71426032124ec19acf16ce588eb9