Observational signature of the direct radiative effect by natural boreal forest aerosols and its relation to the corresponding first indirect effect

Abstract

By using a screened set of long-term aerosol measurement data, the contribution of natural boreal forest aerosols to the direct radiative effect (DRE) was observed at a remote continental site in northern Finland. Averaged over the summer season, the magnitude of this effect at the top of the atmosphere was estimated to be in the range -(0.37-0.74) W m -2 in our study region and possibly somewhat higher over the whole boreal forest region. Globally, the DRE owing to boreal forest aerosols is much smaller than that owing to natural sea salt or dust aerosols, as well as direct radiative forcing by anthropogenic aerosols. We also updated the earlier estimates of the first indirect radiative effect (IRE) by natural boreal forest aerosols. We found that this IRE is likely to be substantially higher, perhaps more than an order of magnitude, than the corresponding DRE. Copyright 2009 by the American Geophysical Union.