Grants and Contributions

The 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer was negotiated and signed by Canada along with 23 other countries. Since then the World Meteorological Organization has had an ongoing mandate to monitor and assess its effectiveness. To do this, they rely on high fidelity data records such as those produced by Canadian satellite instruments. This project will combine satellite and ground based measurements with Canada's OSIRIS instrument time series to produce Canada's long term data record. Canadian model results will be used to better understand this time series.

Improved estimates of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and carbon monoxide (CO) emissions through multi-species and multi-sensor chemical data assimilation
Over the past two decades space agencies around the world have made considerable investments in satellite instruments to measure the changing composition of the atmosphere. We now have a broad range of space-based measurements of atmospheric composition. This project will integrate observations from different satellite instruments to better quantify surface emissions of CO and NOx, which are harmful atmospheric contaminants. Atmospheric CO and NOx are also precursors of tropospheric ozone (O3), which is a harmful pollutant and a powerful greenhouse gas.

The project title is: ""Advanced multi-instrument record of stratospheric aerosol and the climate impact""
Using measurements from Canadian satellite instruments, the objective of this project is to extend and improve the space-based aerosol data record for the lower stratosphere. This is a challenging region to measure, but important as it has been shown to contain a potentially significant portion of the total aerosol budget. An improved dataset will be used in combination with a Canadian coupled atmosphere-ocean climate model to understand the impact of aerosols on climate change.

The project name is ""Climatological, model evaluation and validation studies using data from Canadian satellite and ground-based measurements"". Using data from three Canadian satellites, this research project will study the changing atmosphere and improve our ability to simulate these changes with atmospheric models, in three steps. First, the focus will be on understanding how different types of chlorine-containing gases, related to ozone depletion, are distributed in the atmosphere and vary from year-to-year. Second, the team will examine how different satellite instruments and models describe the region of the atmosphere that can have a significant influence on climate. And third, the quality of new measurements of greenhouse gases and air pollutants made from space will be assessed.

The project name is ""Understanding the role of deep convection in determining the humidity structure in the upper-troposphere and lower-stratosphere (UTLS) and improving model simulation of the process using satellite observations"". Atmospheric water vapor plays a significant role in climate change, but its variation in the UTLS region is currently poorly understood and inadequately simulated by global weather and climate models. Satellite data will be used to quantify the impact of air mass circulation on UTLS water vapor. Operational global models of ECCC will be validated against the observations and high resolution cloud resolving simulations. This research will help improve Canada's ability to predict climate and weather and shed light on future climate monitoring missions.

The project name is ""Assessing the impact of limb sounding on the forecasting of surface pollution and the Air Quality Health Index"". It is generally assumed that stratospheric profile measurements from a space-based limb sounding instrument will lead to improved air quality forecasts (including the Air Quality Health Index). This project will conduct a thorough assessment using the ECCC air quality model and prediction system. Measurements of ozone and nitrogen dioxide from Canada's OSIRIS instrument will be assimilated, and validation and forecast evaluation will be performed using the ACE-FTS instrument on Canada's SCISAT and the North American surface monitoring network.

The project name is ""MOPITT Data Enhancements through Improved Cloud Clearing"". Canada's MOPITT instrument measures global CO levels every three days. It has been in orbit since 1999 and continues to provide excellent data. This project aims to expand the coverage of the MOPITT data through its entire operational life by improving the scientific treatment of clouds in the field of view, thus increasing the amount of observations used to generate the data products. The results will improve the datasets made available by MOPITT and the resulting science coming from the research community around the world.

The project name is ""Modes of Pollution Transport from North America to Nova Scotia and Beyond"". This project aims to quantify the long-term variability of different pollution sources (local, regional and continental) and how they affect air quality in Nova Scotia and other Canadian locations. The study will assess the impacts of weather on air pollution events. In doing so, it will inform policy regarding jurisdictional (provincial, federal, trans-boundary) pollutant reduction.

This project will combine observations from multiple sources of snow, and of the weather events during which snowfall occurs, to learn whether satellite instruments can be used to reliably detect and monitor snow and snowfall over Canada.

The project name is ""CO in the Canadian boreal forest and urban centres"". CO is an atmospheric gas that impacts urban air quality and the global carbon cycle. This project will combine atmospheric observations and modelling of CO to:
• Validate Canada's MOPITT instrument measurements with data from the ground based Total Carbon Column Observing Network (TCCON).
• Assess the impacts of wildfires on the carbon cycle of the boreal forest.
• Quantify global urban ratios of CO to carbon dioxide (CO2) to estimate urban emissions.
MOPITT and ground-based datasets will be complemented by CO2 measurements from NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) and JAXA's Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite (GOSAT).