New turbulent parameterization for a dispersion model in the atmospheric boundary layer

A modeling approach for the dispersion of pollutants released in the atmospheric boundary layer is presented and evaluated. The model includes a continuous formulation for the transport and turbulent diffusion processes that adequately represents the mechanisms in the various regimes of the atmospheric boundary layer. The vertical diffusion coefficients consider shear and buoyant-induced turbulence in a well-behaved functional dependence. The suggested eddy diffusivity and wind speed profiles compare adequately with those reported in the literature and observational data. The evaluation of the proposed dispersion model as well as an independent method, against data from diffusion experiments, showed a satisfactory physical behavior and a good overall statistical performance of each model. An improvement is introduced over the alternative approach with the suggested continuous formulation with similar performance.