Aerosol Distribution Due to Wildfire in Sumatra, Indonesia Considered from Model Simulation

Open burning of biomass has occurred around the world, and emissions from biomass burning are impacting local, regional, and global air quality issues and climate change. This study focuses on severe biomass burning aerosols (BBAs) in Sumatra in September 2019. The chemical transport simulation model employed in this study is based on a meteorological field simulated by SCALE (Scalable Computing for Advanced Library and the Environmental Regional Model) for offline calculations. Simulation results are validated by using ground-based measurements and biomass burning aerosol distribution observed by JAXA/GCOM-C (Global Change Observation Mission-Climate)/SGLI (second-generation global imager). The results of this study show that the injection process in the model simulations has a significant impact on the aerosol distribution. Aerosols generated by fires can rise to higher altitudes due to the heat of the fire, but aerosols originating from surface and soil fires were found to reproduce well at less elevated injection height.