Description: Aeolian dust is a key aspect of the climate system. Dust can modify the Earth's energy budget, provide long-range transport of nutrients, and influence land surface processes via erosion. Consequently, effective modeling of the climate system, particularly at regional scales, requires a reasonably accurate representation of dust emission, transport, and deposition. Here we evaluate African dust in 23 state-of-the-art global climate models used in the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. We find that all models fail to reproduce basic aspects of dust emission and transport over the second half of the twentieth century. The models systematically underestimate dust emission, transport, and optical depth, and year-to-year changes in these properties bear little resemblance to observations. These findings cast doubt on the ability of these models to simulate the regional climate and the response of African dust to future climate change. Key Points: - CMIP5 models underestimate African dust emission and transport - The dust size distribution is biased toward small particles in CMIP5 models - CMIP5 models do not represent coupled processes that involve African dust

Description: This study presents the first climatology for the dust emission amount associated with Nocturnal Low-Level Jets (NLLJs) in North Africa. These wind speed maxima near the top of the nocturnal boundary layer can generate near-surface peak winds due to shear-driven turbulence in the course of the night and the NLLJ breakdown during the following morning. The associated increase in the near-surface wind speed is a driver for mineral dust emission. A new detection algorithm for NLLJs is presented and used for a statistical assessment of NLLJs in 32 years of ERA-Interim reanalysis from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. NLLJs occur in 29% of the nights in the annual and spatial mean. The NLLJ climatology shows a distinct annual cycle with marked regional differences. Maxima of up to 80% NLLJ frequency are found where low-level baroclinicity and orographic channels cause favorable conditions, e.g., over the Bodélé Depression, Chad, for November–February and along the West Saharan and Mauritanian coast for April–September. Downward mixing of NLLJ momentum to the surface causes 15% of mineral dust emission in the annual and spatial mean and can be associated with up to 60% of the total dust amount in specific areas, e.g., the Bodélé Depression and south of the Hoggar-Tibesti Channel. The sharp diurnal cycle underlines the importance of using wind speed information with high temporal resolution as driving fields for dust emission models. Key Points: - Long-term climatology of Nocturnal Low-Level Jets (NLLJ) over North Africa - Newly developed automated detection algorithm for NLLJs - NLLJs contribute 15 % to North African dust emission in annual and spatial mean

Description: Convective cold pools and the breakdown of nocturnal low-level jets (NLLJs) are key meteorological drivers of dust emission over summertime West Africa, the world's largest dust source. This study is the first to quantify their relative contributions and physical interrelations using objective detection algorithms and an off-line dust emission model applied to convection-permitting simulations from the Met Office Unified Model. The study period covers 25 July to 02 September 2006. All estimates may therefore vary on an interannual basis. The main conclusions are as follows: (a) approximately 40% of the dust emissions are from NLLJs, 40% from cold pools, and 20% from unidentified processes (dry convection, land-sea and mountain circulations); (b) more than half of the cold-pool emissions are linked to a newly identified mechanism where aged cold pools form a jet above the nocturnal stable layer; (c) 50% of the dust emissions occur from 1500 to 0200 LT with a minimum around sunrise and after midday, and 60% of the morning-to-noon emissions occur under clear skies, but only 10% of the afternoon-to-nighttime emissions, suggesting large biases in satellite retrievals; (d) considering precipitation and soil moisture effects, cold-pool emissions are reduced by 15%; and (e) models with parameterized convection show substantially less cold-pool emissions but have larger NLLJ contributions. The results are much more sensitive to whether convection is parameterized or explicit than to the choice of the land-surface characterization, which generally is a large source of uncertainty. This study demonstrates the need of realistically representing moist convection and stable nighttime conditions for dust modeling. Key Points: - First quantification of W-African dust uplift by cold pools and LLJs in summer - Newly developed automated detection algorithm for LLJs and cold pools - LLJs and Cold pools each contribute 40% to West African dust emission in summer

Description: REMO-HAM is a new regional aerosol-climate model. It is based on the REMO regional climate model and includes most of the major aerosol processes. The structure for aerosol is similar to the global aerosol-climate model ECHAM5-HAM, for example the aerosol module HAM is coupled with a two-moment stratiform cloud scheme. On the other hand, REMO-HAM does not include an online coupled aerosol-radiation nor a secondary organic aerosol module. In this work, we evaluate the model and compare the results against ECHAM5-HAM and measurements. Four different measurement sites were chosen for the comparison of total number concentrations, size distributions and gas phase sulfur dioxide concentrations: Hyytiälä in Finland, Melpitz in Germany, Mace Head in Ireland and Jungfraujoch in Switzerland. REMO-HAM is run with two different resolutions: 50 × 50 km2 and 10 × 10 km2. Based on our simulations, REMO-HAM is in reasonable agreement with the measured values. The differences in the total number concentrations between REMO-HAM and ECHAM5-HAM can be mainly explained by the difference in the nucleation mode. Since we did not use activation nor kinetic nucleation for the boundary layer, the total number concentrations are somewhat underestimated. From the meteorological point of view, REMO-HAM represents the precipitation fields and 2 m temperature profile very well compared to measurement. Overall, we show that REMO-HAM is a functional aerosol-climate model, which will be used in further studies.

Description: This study presents the first quantitative estimate of the mineral dust emission associated with atmospheric depressions and mobile cyclones in North Africa. Atmospheric depressions are automatically tracked at 925 hPa based on ERA-Interim data from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts for 1989–2008. A set of filter criteria is applied to identify mobile cyclones, i.e. migrating and long-lived cyclones. The shorter term cyclone is used as a synonym for mobile cyclones. Dust emission is calculated with a dust emission model driven by 10 m winds and soil moisture from ERA-Interim. Emission peaks during winter and spring with spatial averages of 250–380 g m−2 per month. Comparison of the dust source activation frequency from the model against SEVIRI satellite observation shows a good agreement in the Bodélé Depression but differences in the north and west of North Africa. Depressions are abundant, particularly in summer when the Saharan heat low is situated over West Africa and during spring in the lee of the Atlas Mountains. Up to 90% (55% annually and spatially averaged) of dust emission occurs within 10 degrees of these depressions, with embedded mechanisms such as nocturnal low-level jets playing a role. Cyclones are rarer and occur primarily north of 20° N in spring in agreement with previous studies and over summertime West Africa consistent with near-surface signatures of African Easterly Waves. Dust emission within 10 degrees of cyclones peaks over Libya with up to 25% in spring. Despite the overall small contribution of 4% annually and spatially averaged, cyclones coincide with particularly intense dust emission events exceeding the climatological mean by a factor of four to eight. Soil moisture weakens dust emission during cyclone passage by about 10%.