Production of boundary layer ozone from tropical American Savannah biomass burning emissions

Boundary layer ozone and carbon monoxide were measured at a savannah site in the Orinoco river basin, during the dry and wet seasons. CO and O3 concentrations recorded around noontime show a good linear correlation, suggesting that the higher ozone levels observed during the dry season are photochemically produced during the oxidation of reactive hydrocarbons in the presence of NOx both emitted by biomass burning. The rate of photochemical ozone production in the boundary layer ozone by biomass burning calculated from the production ratio ΔO3/ΔCO (0.17±0.01 v : v) and the amount of CO produced by fires (0.26–1.3 mole m−2 dry season−1), ranges from 0.6 to 2.6 ppbv h−1 for 8 h of daylight. This O3 production rate is in fairly good agreement with the value derived from RO2 radical measurements made in the Venezuelan savannah during the dry season. The net boundary layer production of O3 from all tropical America savannah fires is estimated to range between 0.28 and 0.36 Tmol O3 per year, which is about 3 times higher than the O3 produced from pollution sources in the eastern United States during the summer. An extrapolation to all of the worldʹs savannah would indicate a net boundary layer ozone production of about 1.2 Tmol yr−1. This is discussed in the context of the overall global budget of tropospheric ozone.