NOAA's HRRR-Smoke model may still be designated as experimental, but when wildfires are burning, many count on it for smoke forecasts.
Running on the newest version of NOAA’s Global Forecast System, or GFS, the FV3-Chem model forecasts the distribution of some primary air pollutants: smoke, soot, organic carbon, sulfate, and large and small particles of dust and sea salt - collectively known as aerosols. Because these aerosols affect the weather, the model also provides weather forecasts.
A NOAA study published in Nature Geosciences takes a new look at faint, old smoke and finds that it is just as important an influence on the climate as the thick plumes produced by active fires.
NOAA has launched a wide-ranging research effort to investigate the impact of reduced vehicle traffic, air travel, shipping, manufacturing and other activities on Earth’s atmosphere and oceans due to the response to COVID-19.
A sooty cloud generated by a 2017 firestorm provided an ideal opportunity for researchers to test a climate model that simulated the lifetime of that soot in the stratosphere.
Findings could help improve air quality in cities across the U.S. West.