Evaluation of FV3GFS and FV3Meso Meteorological Predictions for Multi-scale Air Quality Applications

Operational air quality predictions for the United States are provided at NOAA by the National Air Quality Forecasting Capability (NAQFC). NAQFC provides nationwide operational predictions of ozone and particulate matter. Predictions are produced twice per day (06 and 12 UTC cycles) at 12 km resolution through 48 hours and distributed at http://airquality.weather.gov. The NOAA National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) operational North American Mesoscale (NAM) 12 km weather prediction is used to drive the Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) model. Globally, NCEP runs an inline global aerosol prediction system (the NEMS Global Aerosol Capability) at 1 degree horizontal resolution. Recently, NCEP with other research partners has developed the Next Generation Global Prediction System (NGGPS) based on the Finite Volume Cubed Sphere core FV3 model as it Unified Forecasting System. FV3GFS is run at similar resolutions (13 km) to the NAM while mainly using the standard NCEP global model physics. In addition, NOAA is developing a stand-alone regional version of FV3 (FV3Meso) at 3 km resolutions. Therefore, the transition to FV3 allows the unification of regional and global atmospheric composition predictions.

This presentation will overview current capabilities and future plans for a unified atmospheric composition forecasting system while also evaluating the different versions of FV3 to model boundary layer processes during air quality events in urban, rural and coastal areas. The evaluation will focus on the New York City metropolitan area and the Chesapeake Bay where two i air quality related field experiments were performed during the Summer 2018. The Long Island Sound Tropospheric Ozone Study (LITOS) data will be used for the New York evaluation while the Ozone Water Land Environmental Transition Study (OWLETS-2) data will be used for Chesapeake Bay area. Availability of profiler, aircraft and surface mesonet data of atmospheric composition and meteorological measurements for the experiments will provide anopportunity to evaluate NAM, FV3 and CMAQ predictions. Attention will focus on the evolution of the marine boundary layer and its movement on-shore during weak synoptic forcing and warm, humid conditions when production of ozone is conducive and the influence of the sea breeze is dominant.