Mixing layer height on the North China Plain and meteorological evidence of serious air pollution in southern Hebei

Zhu, Xiaowan; Tang, Guiqian; Guo, Jianping; Hu, Bo; Song, Tao; Wang, Lili; Xin, Jinyuan; Gao, Wenkang; Münkel, Christoph; Schäfer, Klaus; Li, Xin; Wang, Yuesi

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4897-2018

Articles | Volume 18, issue 7

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4897-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Special issue:

Regional transport and transformation of air pollution in...

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-4897-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 7

Research article

|

11 Apr 2018

Research article |

| 11 Apr 2018

Mixing layer height on the North China Plain and meteorological evidence of serious air pollution in southern Hebei

Xiaowan Zhu, Guiqian Tang, Jianping Guo, Bo Hu, Tao Song, Lili Wang, Jinyuan Xin, Wenkang Gao, Christoph Münkel, Klaus Schäfer, Xin Li, and Yuesi Wang

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AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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RC1: 'Comments on "Mixing layer height on the North China Plain and meteorological evidence of serious air pollution in southern Hebei"', Anonymous Referee #1, 10 Jul 2017
- AC1: 'Response to RC1', Guiqian Tang, 16 Dec 2017
SC1: 'Major revision', Xinyi Wang, 23 Aug 2017
- AC3: 'Response to SC', Guiqian Tang, 16 Dec 2017
RC2: 'Review comments on “Mixing layer height on the North China Plain and meteorological evidence of serious air pollution in southern Hebei” by Zhu et al.', Anonymous Referee #3, 27 Oct 2017
- AC2: 'Response to RC2', Guiqian Tang, 16 Dec 2017

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by Guiqian Tang on behalf of the Authors (11 Jan 2018) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (26 Jan 2018) by Renyi Zhang

RR by Anonymous Referee #3 (29 Jan 2018)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

Review comments on “Mixing layer height on the North China Plain and meteorological evidence of serious air pollution in southern Hebei” by Zhu et al.

The spatial and seasonal characteristics of mixing layer height (MLH) over northern China plain (NCP) were revealed by the authors using variety of measurements, primarily focusing on northern NCP and southern Hebei. The authors attempt to explain the different feature of MLH development between the two interested regions by examining observed wind shear, buoyancy and turbulent stability. In addition, this study pointed out that the MLH plays a key role in forming the heavy near-ground particular mater (PM) pollution besides emissions. The paper is well organized and the reasoning for MLH spatial variations and its association with air pollution is comprehensively discussed. I recommend to publish this paper in ACP journal after addressing following minor issues.

1. For Fig. 6: What are the reasons for the difference in buoyancy term profiles between the site XT and BJ during winter, as shown in Fig. 6g? In addition, the absolute values of buoyancy term seem larger than that of shear term; does this mean the buoyancy term rather than the shear term is the dominant component in determining turbulent energy?
2. Line 381-382: It appears that the profiles were averaged over only two time points (i.e. 8:00 am and 08:00 pm), right? Can the average of only two time points represent the entire day MLH features which are most significant during noon time?
3. Line 444-447: In addition to the emission discrepancy and different meteorological factors (like MLH), the aerosol-radiation interactions are a potential candidate to explain different PM pollution between the two interested regions. Therefore, it is better to say 60% is the upper bound of contribution due to meteorological factors.
4. Line 474: a recent ref should also be cited here:
Wang G, et al. (2016) Persistent sulfate formation from London Fog to Chinese haze. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(48):13630-13635.
5. Line 409: “enhance” should be “enhanced” or “enhancement of”.

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RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (12 Feb 2018)

ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (18 Feb 2018) by Renyi Zhang

AR by Guiqian Tang on behalf of the Authors (28 Feb 2018) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (06 Mar 2018) by Renyi Zhang

AR by Guiqian Tang on behalf of the Authors (09 Mar 2018) Author's response Manuscript

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Short summary

Our study first conducted a long-term observation of mixing layer height (MLH) with high resolution on the North China Plain (NCP), analyzed the spatiotemporal variations of regional MLH, investigated the reasons for MLH differences in the NCP and revealed the meteorological reasons for heavy haze pollution in southern Hebei. The study results provide scientific suggestions for regional industrial structure readjustment and have great importance for achieving the integrated development goals.