Mesoscale Modeling of Transport and Deposition of Heavy Metals in Southern Poland

Abstract

The Katowice province in southern Poland experiences serious air pollution problems including deposition of heavy metals which is among the highest in Europe (Bartnicki et al. 1996; Olendrzyński et al., 1996). Heavy metals deposit onto surfaces at relatively low rates, however, due to their toxicity and accumulation in soils, long-term deposition needs to be evaluated. Long-range transport models applied to the whole of Europe cannot simulate high values of local deposition fluxes because of their low spatial resolution. A typical grid cell of the long-range models can cover the whole Katowice province. Therefore, it is necessary to apply a high resolution transport and deposition model linked to a three-dimensional mesoscale/regional meteorological model. Recent advances in computer technology, especially availability of modern workstations, allows one to integrate 3-dimensional mesoscale meteorological models over extended time periods, months or even years, to provide necessary input fields for long term dispersion modeling (Uliasz et al., 1996; Pielke and Uliasz, 1997). This paper presents selected results from the METKAT (heavy METals in the KATowice province) project launched by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in cooperation with two Polish research institutions, Institute for Ecology of Industrial Areas (IEIA), Katowice, and Institute of Meteorology and Water Management (IMWM) in Warsaw, The goal of the project was to investigate high local deposition fluxes of arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb) and zinc (Zn) in the Katowice province with the aid of mesoscale modeling. The extended description of the METKAT study is provided by Uliasz and Olendrzyński (1996).