Remy, S.; Anguelova, M.D. Improving the Representation of Whitecap Fraction and Sea Salt Aerosol Emissions in the ECMWF IFS-AER (vol 13, 4856, 2021)

The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) operates the Integrated Forecasting System aerosol module (IFS-AER) to provide daily global analysis and forecast of aerosols for the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS). New estimates of sea salt aerosol emissions have been implemented in the IFS-AER using a new parameterization of whitecap fraction as a function of wind speed and sea surface temperature. The effect of whitecap fraction simulated by old and new parameterizations has been evaluated by comparing the IFS-AER new sea salt aerosol characteristics to those of aerosol retrievals. The new parameterization brought a significant improvement as compared to the two parameterizations of sea salt aerosol emissions previously implemented in the IFS-AER. Likewise, the simulated sea salt aerosol optical depth and surface concentration are significantly improved, as compared against ground and remote sensing products.