Dust emission, transport, and deposition in central Iran and their radiative forcing effects: A numerical simulation

Abstract

In this study, WRF-Chem was used to analyze the radiative forcing, deposition, emission and transport of mineral dust during three severe dust events in central Iran, specifically in Yazd area. The results showed that central Iran is predominantly influenced by internal dust sources. During these events, the amount of dust emissions and depositions in Iran were about 740–1400 Gg and 50–90 Gg, respectively. In Yazd, the dust emissions and depositions were about 34–104 Gg and 8–16 Gg, respectively, originating from the Ardakan plain and Dasht-e-kavir. In order to analyze the effect of dust on the climate, it was found that dust resulted a surface cooling by shortwave and longwave radiative forcing in the range of −11 to −21 W/m² and 6.7–13.9 W/m², respectively, over Yazd province. In the atmosphere, radiative forcing led to the warming effect with shortwave and longwave radiative forcing in the range of 10.5–19.7 W/m² and -6 to −11 W/m² over Yazd, respectively. Furthermore, it was demonstrated that the radiative forcing associated with dust also had an impact on meteorological parameters. The results showed that this phenomenon influenced microphysical processes and mitigated the climatic effects of dust.