Atmospheric and Environmental Impacts of Volcanic Particulates

Lifetimes of atmospheric species: Integrating environmental impacts

[1] The environmental damage caused by atmospheric pollutants is proportional to the duration of their effects. The global impacts of greenhouse gases (as measured by global warming potential) and ozone depleting substances (as measured by ozone depletion potential) have traditionally been calculated using the atmospheric lifetime of the source gas as a quantitative measure of the impact’s dura...

Modeling of Particulates and Condensates in Io’s Pele-type Volcanic

Atmospheric chemistry in volcanic plumes.

Recent field observations have shown that the atmospheric plumes of quiescently degassing volcanoes are chemically very active, pointing to the role of chemical cycles involving halogen species and heterogeneous reactions on aerosol particles that have previously been unexplored for this type of volcanic plumes. Key features of these measurements can be reproduced by numerical models such as th...

Excitation of atmospheric oscillations by volcanic eruptions

We investigated the mechanism of atmospheric oscillations with periods of about 300 s which were observed for the 1991 Pinatubo and the 1982 E1 Chich6n eruptions. Two distinct spectral peaks, at T=270 and 230 s for the Pinatubo eruption and at T=195 and 266 s for the E1 Chich6n eruptions, have been reported. We found similar oscillations for the 1980 Mount St. Helens and the 1883 Krakatoa erupt...

Environmental impacts on health from continuous volcanic activity at Yasur (Tanna) and Ambrym, Vanuatu.

Continuous low-level basaltic volcanic activity, from Yasur Volcano in Tanna, and Marum and Benbow vents on Ambrym, occurred for as long as records have been kept in Vanuatu. The potential chronic health implications for the inhabitants of these two areas were investigated in a preliminary environmental sampling program. The focus was particularly on fluoride and other volcanic gas-derived chem...