Comment on essd-2022-272

This paper describes results of the first phase of a Gas Research Institute (GRI) funded research program. The overall purpose of this research is to advance a fundamental change in the method currently used to drill and complete natural gas wells applying the U.S. Defense Department's StarWars laser technology. Results of tests conducted at the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Army's high power laser research facilities are presented. Initial testing on reservoir rocks conducted with the Mid Infrared Advanced Chemical Laser (MIRACL) at the U.S. Army's High Energy Laser Systems Test Facility at White Sands, New Mexico, showed the potential for laser drilling. The laser beam drilled at a speed that indicates penetration could be increased by more than 100 times current rates. Planned testing for the next phase of this research is to use the Chemical Oxygen-Iodine Laser (COIL) high powered laser invented in 1977 by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for air-to-air defense. COIL has gained notoriety as an airborne laser tactical weapon capable of tracking and destroying missiles. An annotated bibliography was developed for the GRI that comprehensively reviews published laser-rock interaction, current drilling research, and technical data related to laser applications in non-reservoir rocks.1 Developing commercial applications of StarWars laser technologies has commenced not only in the U.S., but also in Russia and the former Soviet Union.

Accurate representation of global stratospheric aerosols from volcanic and nonvolcanic sulfur emissions is key to understanding the cooling effects and ozone losses that may be linked to volcanic activity. Attribution of climate variability to volcanic activity is of particular interest in relation to the post‐2000 slowing in the rate of global average temperature increases. We have compiled a database of volcanic SO2 emissions and plume altitudes for eruptions from 1990 to 2014 and developed a new prognostic capability for simulating stratospheric sulfate aerosols in the Community Earth System Model. We used these combined with other nonvolcanic emissions of sulfur sources to reconstruct global aerosol properties from 1990 to 2014. Our calculations show remarkable agreement with ground‐based lidar observations of stratospheric aerosol optical depth (SAOD) and with in situ measurements of stratospheric aerosol surface area density (SAD). These properties are key parameters in calculating the radiative and chemical effects of stratospheric aerosols. Our SAOD calculations represent a clear improvement over available satellite‐based analyses, which generally ignore aerosol extinction below 15 km, a region that can contain the vast majority of stratospheric aerosol extinction at middle and high latitudes. Our SAD calculations greatly improve on that provided for the Chemistry‐Climate Model Initiative, which misses about 60% of the SAD measured in situ on average during both volcanically active and volcanically quiescent periods.

Accurate representation of global stratospheric aerosols from volcanic and non-volcanic sulfur emissions is key to understanding the cooling effects and ozone-losses that may be linked to volcanic activity. Attribution of climate variability to volcanic activity is of particular interest in relation to the post-2000 slowing in the rate of global average temperature increases. We have compiled a database of volcanic SO2 emissions and plume altitudes for eruptions from 1990 to 2014, and developed a new prognostic capability for simulating stratospheric sulfate aerosols in the Community Earth System Model (CESM). We used these combined with other non-volcanic emissions of sulfur sources to reconstruct global aerosol properties from 1990 to 2014. Our calculations show remarkable agreement with ground-based lidar observations of stratospheric aerosol optical depth (SAOD), and with in situ measurements of stratospheric aerosol surface area density (SAD). These properties are key parameters in calculating the radiative and chemical effects of stratospheric aerosols. Our SAOD calculations represent a clear improvement over available satellite-based analyses, which generally ignore aerosol extinction below 15 km, a region that can contain the vast majority of stratospheric aerosol extinction at mid- and high-latitudes. Our SAD calculations greatly improve on that provided for the Chemistry-Climate Model Initiative, which misses about 60% of the SAD measured in situ on average during both volcanically active and volcanically quiescent periods.

Extratropical eruptions have been associated with major cooling in the Northern Hemisphere over the last 2000 years (Toohey et al., 2019; Burke et al., 2023).  However, our ability to reconstruct the stratospheric aerosol loading from these events is limited by uncertainties in the conversion of sulfate flux to the polar ice sheets into a stratospheric sulfur loading or aerosol optical depth. Current methods (e.g. Gao et al. 2007; Toohey and Sigl, 2017) assume that all of the ice core sulfate from these eruptions is deposited via the stratospheric overworld, but sulfur isotope evidence shows that a substantial proportion of ice core sulfate comes via lower altitudes. Here we evaluate the magnitude of this complication across many of the major extratropical eruptions over the last several thousand years, including eruptions from the Katmai/Novarupta, Aniakchak, and Okmok volcanoes, and investigate the implications of these findings for stratospheric aerosol forcing records currently used in climate models.  Burke, A., Innes, H.M., Crick, L., Anchukaitis, K.J., Byrne, M.P., Hutchison, W., McConnell, J.R., Moore, K.A., Rae, J.W., Sigl, M. and Wilson, R., 2023. High sensitivity of summer temperatures to stratospheric sulfur loading from volcanoes in the Northern Hemisphere. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(47), p.e2221810120.Gao, C., Oman, L., Robock, A. and Stenchikov, G.L., 2007. Atmospheric volcanic loading derived from bipolar ice cores: Accounting for the spatial distribution of volcanic deposition. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 112(D9).Toohey, M. and Sigl, M., 2017. Volcanic stratospheric sulfur injections and aerosol optical depth from 500 BCE to 1900 CE. Earth System Science Data, 9(2), pp.809-831.Toohey, M., Krüger, K., Schmidt, H., Timmreck, C., Sigl, M., Stoffel, M. and Wilson, R., 2019. Disproportionately strong climate forcing from extratropical explosive volcanic eruptions. Nature Geoscience, 12(2), pp.100-107.

Temporal variations of the aerosol optical depth of the Antarctic troposphere and stratosphere are considered on the basis of long‐term Sun photometer and actinometer measurements which have been made at Mirny and Georg Forster stations since 1956 and 1988, respectively. This data is supplemented by measurements of the stratospheric aerosol optical depth by the satellite‐borne stratospheric aerosol measurement II instrument. These observations indicate that under undisturbed conditions, the stratospheric aerosol optical depth represents approximately 25% of the total atmospheric aerosol optical depth. The aerosol optical depth in the Antarctic is most notably affected by volcanic eruptions, such as El Chichon in 1982 and Mount Pinatubo and Cerro Hudson in 1991, and by the occurrence of polar stratospheric clouds during Antarctic winter and spring. Apart from these episodic events, no long‐term trend in the aerosol optical depth can be discerned from the nearly 40‐year record.

: Some of the research done at the Air Force Cambridge Research Center Geophysics Research Directorate and the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories during the early years of the Space Program is reviewed. Vignettes are provided of some of the programs in which the laboratories were world leaders. The period starts with the testing of captured V-2 rockets at White Sands, NM in 1946 and ends with satellites that were launched in 1983. A very extensive scientific rocket program from 1956 had the goals of determining the properties of the upper atmosphere and ionosphere and, in some cases, modifying them. There was participation in many joint field programs with other organizations. When the satellite age started in 1957, AFCRC was in the forefront of supporting satellite tracking, determining drag effects on orbits, and developing first time accurate upper atmosphere models. This was followed by developing and flying unique satellites to determine atmospheric properties and providing instruments for satellites that were developed jointly with other DoD organizations and NASA. Finally, the laboratory made major contributions to the development of updated versions of the U. S. Standard Atmosphere and Supplements, and to the development of several versions of CIRA (CO SPAR International Reference Atmospheres).

In this paper the properties of the stratospheric aerosol optical depth (above 50 mbar) have been studied by using aerosol extinction profiles (at 1 μm) derived from the Stratospheric Aerosol Measurement (SAM II) and Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment (SAGE) during warming periods in the northern hemisphere. It is shown that, during the disturbed periods in winter, low values of aerosol optical depth (<0.2×10−3) are found within the low‐pressure system(s) (at the 30‐mbar pressure surface), while high values are found outside. Similar characteristics are found to exist for the simultaneously observed SAGE O3 and NO2 columnar density distributions. Strong longitudinal gradients are shown with the low values within and wherever the vortex exists. This characteristic is maintained during and after the circumpolar vortex is disturbed, even after breakdown, indicating an isolation of the material within the vortex.

Research supported by the Meteorology Laboratory, Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories, Office of Aerospace Research, United States Air Force, L.G. Hanscom Field, Massachusetts.

Abstract. After 43 years of inactivity, the Calbuco volcano, which is located in the southern part of Chile, erupted on 22 April 2015. The space–time evolutions (distribution and transport) of its aerosol plume are investigated by combining satellite (CALIOP, IASI, OMPS), in situ aerosol counting (LOAC OPC) and lidar observations, and the MIMOSA advection model. The Calbuco aerosol plume reached the Indian Ocean 1 week after the eruption. Over the Reunion Island site (21° S, 55.5° E), the aerosol signal was unambiguously enhanced in comparison with background conditions, with a volcanic aerosol layer extending from 18 to 21 km during the May–July period. All the data reveal an increase by a factor of ∼ 2 in the SAOD (stratospheric aerosol optical depth) with respect to values observed before the eruption. The aerosol mass e-folding time is approximately 90 days, which is rather close to the value ( ∼ 80 days) reported for the Sarychev eruption. Microphysical measurements obtained before, during, and after the eruption reflecting the impact of the Calbuco eruption on the lower stratospheric aerosol content have been analyzed over the Reunion Island site. During the passage of the plume, the volcanic aerosol was characterized by an effective radius of 0.16 ± 0.02 µm with a unimodal size distribution for particles above 0.2 µm in diameter. Particle concentrations for sizes larger than 1 µm are too low to be properly detected by the LOAC OPC. The aerosol number concentration was ∼ 20 times higher that observed before and 1 year after the eruption. According to OMPS and lidar observations, a tendency toward conditions before the eruption was observed by April 2016. The volcanic aerosol plume is advected eastward in the Southern Hemisphere and its latitudinal extent is clearly bounded by the subtropical barrier and the polar vortex. The transient behavior of the aerosol layers observed above Reunion Island between May and July 2015 reflects an inhomogeneous spatio-temporal distribution of the plume, which is controlled by the localization of these dynamical barriers.

In earlier papers we presented results of parametric studies of the separate and combined effects of aerosol microphysical processes on the time dependence of extinction of four visible and IR laser beams traversing an aerosol medium. Results of these studies can be applied to monitor the temporal changes of aerosol properties inside a cloud chamber or in an open environment in the troposphere. As a continuation of this series, the effects of growth and evaporation of sulfuric acid aerosols in the stratosphere on the extinction of solar radiation traversing such an aerosol medium are reported in this paper. Extinction of 1.0-microm solar radiation was studied since this wavelength was used to monitor the aerosol extinction properties by two recent satellite experiments: Stratospheric Aerosol Measurement II (SAM II) and Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment (SAGE). Our modeling results show that aerosol extinction is not very sensitive to the change of ambient water vapor concentration but is sensitive to the change of ambient temperature, especially at low ambient temperature and high ambient water vapor concentration. The effects of initial aerosol size distribution and composition on the change of aerosol extinction due to growth and evaporation processes are elucidated. The application of results of this parametric study is discussed.

Smoke from Western North American wildfires reached the stratosphere in large amounts in August 2017. Limb-oriented satellite-based sensors are commonly used for studies of wildfire aerosol injected into the stratosphere (OMPS-LP (Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite Limb Profiler) and SAGE III/ISS (Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment III on the International Space Station)). We find that these methods are inadequate for studies the first 1–2 months after such a strong fire event due to event termination (“saturation”). The nadir-viewing lidar CALIOP (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization) is less affected due to shorter path in the smoke, and, further, provides means that we could use to develop a method to correct for strong attenuation of the signal. After the initial phase, the aerosol optical depth (AOD) from OMPS-LP and CALOP show very good agreement above the 380 K isentrope, whereas the OMPS-LP tends to produce higher AOD than CALIOP in the lowermost stratosphere (LMS), probably due to reduced sensitivity at altitudes below 17 km. Time series from CALIOP of attenuation-corrected stratospheric AOD of wildfire smoke show an exponential decline during the first month after the fire, which coincides with highly significant changes in the wildfire aerosol optical properties. The AOD decline is verified by the evolution of the smoke layer composition, comparing the aerosol scattering ratio (CALIOP) to the water vapor concentration from MLS (Microwave Limb Sounder). Initially the stratospheric wildfire smoke AOD is comparable with the most important volcanic eruptions during the last 25 years. Wildfire aerosol declines much faster, 80–90 % of the AOD is removed with a half-life of approximately 10 days. We hypothesize that this dramatic decline is caused by photolytic loss. This process is rarely observed in the atmosphere. However, in the stratosphere this process can be studied with practically no influence from wet deposition, in contrast to the troposphere where this is the main removal path of sub-micron aerosol particles. Despite the loss, the aerosol particles from wildfire smoke in the stratosphere are relevant for the climate.

<strong class="journal-contentHeaderColor">Abstract.</strong> The injection of sulfur into the stratosphere by volcanic eruptions is the dominant driver of natural climate variability on interannual-to-multidecadal timescales. Based on a set of continuous sulfate and sulfur records from a suite of ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica, the HolVol v.1.0 database includes estimates of the magnitudes and approximate source latitudes of major volcanic stratospheric sulfur injection (VSSI) events for the Holocene (from 9500 BCE or 11500 year BP to 1900 CE), constituting an extension of the previous record by 7000 years. The database incorporates new-generation ice-core aerosol records with sub-annual temporal resolution and demonstrated sub-decadal dating accuracy and precision. By tightly aligning and stacking the ice-core records on the WD2014 chronology from Antarctica we resolve long-standing previous inconsistencies in the dating of ancient volcanic eruptions that arise from biased (i.e. dated too old) ice-core chronologies over the Holocene for Greenland. We reconstruct a total of 850 volcanic eruptions with injections in excess of 1 TgS, of which 329 (39 %) are located in the low latitudes with bipolar sulfate deposition, 426 (50 %) are located in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) extratropics and 88 (10 %) are located in the Southern Hemisphere (SH) extratropics. The spatial distribution of reconstructed eruption locations is in agreement with prior reconstructions for the past 2,500 years, and follows the global distribution of landmasses. In total, these eruptions injected 7410 TgS in the stratosphere, for which tropical eruptions accounted for 70 % and NH extratropics for 25 %. A long-term latitudinally and monthly resolved stratospheric aerosol optical depth (SAOD) time series is reconstructed from the HolVol VSSI estimates, representing the first Holocene-scale reconstruction constrained by Greenland and Antarctica ice cores. These new long-term reconstructions of past VSSI and SAOD variability confirm evidence from regional volcanic eruption chronologies (e.g., from Iceland) in showing that the early Holocene (9500&ndash;7000 BCE) experienced a higher number of volcanic eruptions (+16 %) and cumulative VSSI (+86 %) compared to the past 2,500 years. This increase coincides with the rapid retreat of ice sheets during deglaciation, providing context for potential future increases of volcanic activity in regions under projected glacier melting in the 21st century. The reconstructed VSSI and SAOD data are available at <a href="https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.928646" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.928646</a> (Sigl et al., 2021).

Upper troposphere (UT) and lower stratosphere (LS) aerosol characteristics are studied over a tropical station Gadanki (13.5°N, 79.2°E), using 532‐nm Nd:YAG lidar during 2001–2005. Scattering ratios (SR) and aerosol extinction are found to exhibit seasonal and interannual variations in UT (10–15 km) and LS (18–30 km). SR is about 1.00–1.2 in the 10‐ to 30‐km altitude region. Aerosol extinction is about 0.5–6 × 10−3 km−1. SR in UT in 2001 and 2004 during winter is lower than that of summer, whereas LS winter profiles are found to have higher SR values. SR values apparently experience a shift in altitude corresponding to the seasonal change in tropopause indicating a relation between the two. UT integrated extinction is about 2.5 times higher than LS extinction. The correlation between UT and LS monthly mean aerosol extinction was weak and negative with a coefficient of 0.4. UT and LS aerosol extinctions over Gadanki are found to exhibit an increasing trend during 2001–2005. The percentage contribution of integrated aerosol extinction in the 10‐ to 30‐km region to aerosol optical depth (AOD) is about 12%. Correlation coefficient between monthly mean AOD and the 10‐ to 30‐km integrated extinction is about 0.6. The increasing trends in UT and LS aerosols seem to support the finding that emissions from subtropical and tropical Asia may have already started to influence the amount of sulfur containing gases reaching UT and LS. This becomes relevant in the climate change context as it has been shown that increasing aerosol abundances may be impacting the monsoon.

A bistatic lidar configuration of a wide-angle camera (100°) and vertically pointed laser (532 nm) was used to profile aerosols at a coastal site. Aerosol profiles were measured on two evenings from the surface through the boundary layer. The site, on the eastern tip of the Big Island of Hawaii, is influenced by both marine boundary layer aerosols and breaking waves. Two nephelometers, located at 7 and 25 m above sea level, were compared directly with the 0.5-m-altitude resolution of the camera lidar (clidar). At 7 m, changes in aerosol were tracked quite well by the clidar. At 25 m the aerosol was fairly constant and a useful comparison could only be made with averaged values. The clidar results showed a steep gradient (decreasing with altitude) in the aerosol extinction from 7 to about 35 m. The gradient continued to 200 m at a lower rate. This demonstrated the use of the clidar in characterizing the environment for the in situ aerosol sampling. Both a measured and a NASA Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET)-derived aerosol phase function, representing similar marine conditions but from different locations, were used to convert the single-angle clidar scatter to extinction. The measured function gave the best fit to the near-surface nephelometer data. The extinction/backscatter ratio, derived by comparing the NASA Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aerosol optical depth to the integrated clidar profile, was higher than the long-term average value from the AERONET aerosol phase function.

Abstract. Perturbations in stratospheric aerosol due to explosive volcanic eruptions are a primary contributor to natural climate variability. Observations of stratospheric aerosol are available for the past decades, and information from ice cores has been used to derive estimates of stratospheric sulfur injections and aerosol optical depth over the Holocene (approximately 10 000 BP to present) and into the last glacial period, extending back to 60 000 BP. Tephra records of past volcanism, compared to ice cores, are less complete but extend much further into the past. To support model studies of the potential impacts of explosive volcanism on climate variability across timescales, we present here an ensemble reconstruction of volcanic stratospheric sulfur injection (VSSI) over the last 140 000 years that is based primarily on terrestrial and marine tephra records. VSSI values are computed as a simple function of eruption magnitude based on VSSI estimates from ice cores and satellite observations for identified eruptions. To correct for the incompleteness of the tephra record, we include stochastically generated synthetic eruptions assuming a constant background eruption frequency from the ice core Holocene record. While the reconstruction often differs from ice core estimates for specific eruptions due to uncertainties in the data used and reconstruction method, it shows good agreement with an ice-core-based VSSI reconstruction in terms of millennial-scale cumulative VSSI variations over the Holocene. The PalVol reconstruction provides a new basis to test the contributions of forced vs. unforced natural variability to the spectrum of climate and the mechanisms leading to abrupt transitions in the palaeoclimate record with low- to high-complexity climate models. The PalVol volcanic forcing reconstruction is available at https://doi.org/10.26050/WDCC/PalVolv1 (Toohey and Schindlbeck-Belo, 2023).