PM trends in Europe : multi-model and monitoring assessment
Abstract
PM trends in Europe during the last decades have been assessed using a multi-model approach in the framework of Eurodelta-TRENDS exercise initiated by the European Monitoring and Evaluation Program Task Force on Measurements and Modeling (EMEP-TFMM). Seven regional models (EMEP/MSC-W, CHIMERE, CMAQ, LOTOS-EUROS, MINNI, Polair3D and WRF-Chem, participated in the EURODELTA-Trends exercise, which builds upon previous iterations of the CITYDELTA and EURODELTA projects (Thunis et al., 2007; Cuvelier et al., 2007; Bessagnet et al., 2014). Three of the models performed a 21-year hindcast over Europe for the 1990-2010 period, while all the models made calculations for the years 1990, 2000 and 2010. In addition, a series of sensitivity tests have been performed with the purpose of studying the role of meteorological variability, emission changes and boundary conditions. For the period of 2001-2010, for which enough of PM monitoring data is available, the trends in PM10 and PM2.5 have been studied based on both modelling results and measurement data. The Mann-Kendall test are applied to calculated and measured annual mean concentrations to detect significant (90% probability) trends, whereas the Sen’s slopes are calculated to estimate the absolute and relative declines in PM...