ACP Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ACP 1680-7324 Copernicus GmbH Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/acp-8-3441-2008 Mercury in the snow and firn at Summit Station, Central Greenland, and implications for the study of past atmospheric mercury levels Faïn X. 1 Ferrari C. P. 1 4 7 Dommergue A. 1 4 Albert M. 2 Battle M. 3 Arnaud L. 1 Barnola J.-M. 1 Cairns W. 5 Barbante C. 5 Boutron C. 1 6 7 Laboratoire de Glaciologie et Géophysique de l'Environnement (UMR 5183 CNRS/Université Joseph Fourier), 54 rue Molière, B.P. 96, 38402 St Martin d'Heres cedex, France Geophysical Sciences Division – ERDC Cold Regions Research & Engineering Lab, 72 Lyme Road, Hanover, N.H. 03755, USA Dept. of Physics and Astronomy – Bowdoin College, 8800 College Station, Brunswick, ME 04011-8488, USA Polytech' Grenoble, Université Joseph Fourier, 28 avenue Benoît Frachon, B.P. 53, 38041 Grenoble cedex, France Environmental Sciences Department, University of Venice, Calle Larga S. Marta, 2137, 30123 Venice, Italy Unité de Formation et de Recherche de Physique, Université Joseph Fourier, B.P. 53, 38041 Grenoble cedex, France Institut Universitaire de France, 103 boulevard Saint-Michel, 75005 Paris, France 02 07 2008 8 13 3441 3457 This is an open-access article ditributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. This article is available from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/8/3441/2008/acp-8-3441-2008.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/8/3441/2008/acp-8-3441-2008.pdf

Gaseous Elemental Mercury (Hg° or GEM) was investigated at Summit Station, Greenland, in the interstitial air extracted from the perennial snowpack (firn) at depths ranging from the surface to 30 m, during summer 2005 and spring 2006. Photolytic production and destruction of Hg° were observed close to the snow surface during summer 2005 and spring 2006, and we observed dark oxidation of GEM up to 270 cm depth in June 2006. Photochemical transformation of gaseous elemental mercury resulted in diel variations in the concentrations of this gas in the near-surface interstitial air, but destruction of Hg° was predominant in June, and production was the main process in July. This seasonal evolution of the chemical mechanisms involving gaseous elemental mercury produces a signal that propagates downward through the firn air, but is unobservably small below 15 m in depth. As a consequence, multi-annual averaged records of GEM concentration should be well preserved in deep firn air at depths below 15 m, and available for the reconstruction of the past atmospheric history of GEM over the last decades.

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