Scientists now have a better understanding of how wildfire smoke impacts air quality by the data collected by a specially equipped jet. This jet has been flying and studying wildfire plumes for quite a time now.
Scientists have found a mechanism to predict the production of pollutant in Ozone as it can create a poor breathing condition for humans and harm ecosystem as well.
The research team also found out that urban pollution and wildfire smoke can harm the production of Ozone. R. Stanton Avery Professor, Paul O. Wennberg said, it is known to all of us that wildfires damages air quality. But it is also important to understand the chemical and physical mechanisms way of wildfires to damage air quality in order to predict how individual wildfire will affect communities.
This research paper has been published in Science Advances.
The researchers studied data collected by NASA’s NOAA FIREX-AQ project. Scientists say, smoke is really hard to study. It is also difficult to collect sample from aircraft because of the lack of visibility. But the NOAA FIREX-AQ was a well-instrumented aircraft that overcame these barriers easily.
Scientists say that wildfires increase regional ozone across the entire US during fire seasons. They also say that the localities which are in close proximity to the area of wildfire will be impacted the most. Western US is also experiencing wildfires more often than ever in past few years.
Scientists also found out the Ozone layer can only be harmed by the HONO emitted from the fire. Also, VOCs and NO has their own contribution in damaging air quality. When the smoke gets mixed with nitric oxide rich urban atmospheres, it produces ozone.
The scientists also though of using the FIREX-AQ data to have more insights. According to scientists there are more to know about the relation between fire chemistry and air quality.
