Evaluation of modeled smoke plumes of wildfires in the Argentinian Patagonia, against satellite observations

María Fernanda García Ferreyra; Carlos Marcelo Scavuzzo; Lidia Ana Otero; Gabriele Curci

doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2025.126540

Evaluation of modeled smoke plumes of wildfires in the Argentinian Patagonia, against satellite observations

Environ Pollut. 2025 Jun 11:382:126540. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2025.126540. Online ahead of print.

Authors

María Fernanda García Ferreyra¹, Carlos Marcelo Scavuzzo², Lidia Ana Otero³, Gabriele Curci⁴

Affiliations

¹ Instituto de Altos Estudios Espaciales Mario Gulich, Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales, Ruta C45, km 8, Falda de Cañete, X5187XAC, Córdoba, Argentina; Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Av. Haya de la Torre S/N, Córdoba, X5000, Córdoba, Argentina. Electronic address: fgarciaferreyra@conae.gov.ar.
² Instituto de Altos Estudios Espaciales Mario Gulich, Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales, Ruta C45, km 8, Falda de Cañete, X5187XAC, Córdoba, Argentina; Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Av. Haya de la Torre S/N, Córdoba, X5000, Córdoba, Argentina.
³ Facultad de Ingeniería del Ejército, Universidad de la Defensa Nacional, Av. Cabildo 15, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, C1426AAA, Argentina.
⁴ Department of Physical and Chemical Sciences, Università degli Studi dell'Aquila, Via Vetoio, Coppito, L'Aquila, 67100, Abruzzo, Italy.

PMID: 40513798
DOI: 10.1016/j.envpol.2025.126540

Abstract

Carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds and aerosols are the dominant species emitted by wildfires, affecting air quality and contributing to global greenhouse gases. This study implements the APIFLAME fire emissions model, the EDGAR anthropogenic emission inventory, the WRF weather prediction model, and the CHIMERE chemical transport model to simulate air quality during wildfires. Three configurations assessed the impact of smoke injection height: a standard configuration with a plume rise model and fixed heights at 2500 and 5000 m. The case study is a wildfire in Patagonia during summer 2018, burning over a million hectares. Fire emissions were in the order of (CO, NMVOCs) and surpassed (NO_x, PM10, PM2.5 and SO₂) the annual Argentinian emissions from transport and oil refineries. NO₂ and aerosol optical depth (AOD) were assessed with satellite data: QA4ECV/OMI (KNMI) and MAIAC/MODIS (NASA). To compare modeled- to satellite NO₂, averaging kernels were applied. All configurations showed high correlation (ρ>0.69) and a deviation of -10.38 to 3.93% for different radii around the hotspots. Concerning AOD, normalized mean bias overpredicts the lowest deviation locally when compared to 470 nm MAIAC data, at 0.25-0.50^∘ around the hotspot positions, for the 5000 m injection height configuration (28.8 to 28.6%), 2500 m injection height configuration (46.83 to 52.69%) and standard configuration (60.21 to 66.2%). In addition, the spatio-temporal evolution of the plume was well reproduced by the standard configuration. Model-satellite intercomparisons in the spatial domain reveal long-range transport, complementing local statistical metrics, and highlight the influence of injection height on plume dispersion. This study provides valuable insights into the impact of wildfires on air quality in Patagonia. Given limited ground-based observations, future work should evaluate updated satellite datasets and refine fire emission estimates.

Keywords: Aerosol optical depth; CHIMERE; Nitrogen dioxide; Patagonia; Satellite; Wildfire.