Pavla Dagsson Waldhauserova

Agricultural University of Iceland | LBHI

It is increasingly recognized that light-absorbing impurities (LAI) deposited on snow and ice affect their albedo and facilitate melting processes leading to various feedback loops, such as the ice albedo feedback mechanism. Black carbon (BC) is often considered the most important LAI, but some areas can be more impacted by high dust emissions. Ice...

Dust emission fluxes during wind soil erosion are usually estimated using a dust concentration vertical gradient, by assuming a constant dust flux layer between the surface and the dust measurement levels. Here, we investigate the existence of this layer during erosion events recorded in Iceland and Jordan. Size‐resolved dust fluxes were estimated...

Arctic and sub-Arctic terrestrial environments often have bare surfaces, thin and poorly developed soils, large amounts of loose sediment, and low and sparse vegetation. The sensitivity of these sites to modern climate change is reflected, among other things, in an increase in the activity of erosion processes mainly via deflation. Despite the deve...

An integrated morphological and chemical analysis of Arctic aerosols was undertaken for Icelandic dust and Svalbard aerosols to be compared by scanning electron microscopy coupled with EDS microanalysis (SEM-EDS) via imaging and chemical analysis techniques. Results of the characterization of the particles from both surface sediments and suspended...

The termini of Icelandic glaciers are highly dynamic environments. Pronounced changes in frontal ablation in recent years have consequently changed ice dynamics. In this study, we reveal the inter-seasonal dynamics of the Kvíárjökull ablation zone and proglacial zone using ArcticDEM and Sentinel-2 images acquired between 2011 and 2021 and intra-sea...

The number and intensity of Saharan dust storm events identified in Europe has been increasing over the last decade. This can be explained by the role of ongoing climate change. An extension of previous studies covering a 40-year period is presented in this paper, with new data on the frequency, synoptic meteorological background, source areas, gra...

Mineral dust produced by wind erosion of arid and semi-arid surfaces is a major component of atmospheric aerosol that affects climate, weather, ecosystems, and socio-economic sectors such as human health, transportation, solar energy, and air quality. Understanding these effects and ultimately improving the resilience of affected countries requires...

Icelandic dust can impact the radiative budget in high-latitude regions directly by affecting light absorption and scattering and indirectly by changing the surface albedo after dust deposition. This tends to produce a positive radiative forcing. However, the limited knowledge of the spectral optical properties of Icelandic dust prevents an accurat...

Snow sampling, either by inserting a tube through the entire snowpack or by taking samples from the vertical profile, is widely applied to measure the snow depth, density, and snow water equivalent (SWE). A comparative study of snow-sampling methods was carried out on 24 March 2022 in Sodankylä, Finland. Six groups from five countries (Estonia, Fin...

Icelandic dust can impact the radiative budget in high-latitude regions directly by affecting light absorption and scattering and indirectly by changing the surface albedo after dust deposition. This tends to produce a positive radiative forcing. However, the limited knowledge of the spectral optical properties of Icelandic dust prevents an accurat...

Dust consists of fine and coarse particles that travel in the atmosphere and are deposited on the Earth’s surface. Dust particles deposited on snow and ice can cause snow darkening and contribute to melting. In this chapter, we summarise existing knowledge on local and long-range dust sources in Svalbard, and describe current methodologies for stud...

Iceland is known for having strong aeolian erosion events, as evidenced by erosional escarpments on the soil surface; these are known locally as rofabards. The aim of the study was to estimate aeolian erosion rates at two research plots affected by severe erosion, using anatomic features of the roots of Arctic, woody, dwarf shrubs. Ours is the firs...

Light-absorbing impurities such as mineral dust can play a major role in reducing the albedo of snow surfaces. Particularly in spring, deposited dust particles lead to increased snow melt and trigger further feedbacks at the land surface and in the atmosphere. Quantifying the extent of dust-induced variations is difficult due to the high variabilit...

Dust particles from high latitudes have a potentially large local, regional, and global significance to climate and the environment as short-lived climate forcers, air pollutants, and nutrient sources. Identifying the locations of local dust sources and their emission, transport, and deposition processes is important for understanding the multiple...

Icelandic topsoil sediments, as confirmed by numerous scientific studies, represent the largest and the most important European source of mineral dust. Strong winds, connected with the intensive cyclonic circulation in the North Atlantic, induce intense emissions of mineral dust from local sources all year and carry away these fine aerosol particle...

In late March 2018, a large part of the Eastern Mediterranean experienced an extraordinary episode of African dust, one of the most intense in recent years, here referred to as the “Minoan Red” event. The episode mainly affected the Greek island of Crete, where the highest aerosol concentrations over the past 15 yeas were recorded, although impacts...

Our experimental study shows a large transient uptake of SO2 by natural Icelandic volcanic dust samples submitted to UV light under realistic atmospheric conditions.

Dust particles emitted from high latitudes (≥ 50° N and ≥ 40° S, including Arctic as a subregion ≥ 60° N), have a potentially large local, regional, and global significance to climate and environment as short-lived climate forcers, air pollutants and nutrient sources. To understand the multiple impacts of the High Latitude Dust (HLD) on the Earth s...

The WMO Global Sand and Dust Storm Warning Advisory and Assessment System (SDS-WAS) is intended to provide continuous and improved SDS operational forecasts as well as to facilitate international coordinated SDS research in the earth-system science domain, fostering the seamless forecast of SDSs, air quality and chemical weather. It is also expecte...

Mineral dust emissions from Saharan sources have an impact on the atmospheric environment and sedimentary units in distant regions. Here, we present the first systematic observations of long-range Saharan dust transport towards Iceland. Fifteen Saharan dust episodes were identified to have occurred between 2008 and 2020 based on aerosol optical dep...

The results of a preliminary investigation of the dust sources in the Arctic based on their geochemical properties by potential source contribution function (PSCF) analysis are presented in this paper. For this purpose, we considered one year of aerosol geochemical data from Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, and a short list of chemical elements (i.e., Al, Fe,...

Iceland is a highly active source of natural dust. Icelandic dust has the potential to directly affect the climate via dust–radiation interaction and indirectly via dust–cloud interaction, the snow/ice albedo effect and impacts on biogeochemical cycles. The impacts of Icelandic dust depend on its mineralogical and chemical composition. However, a l...

The 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajökull produced volcanic ash that was mostly deposited to the south and east of the volcano, with the thickest deposits closest to the eruption vents. For months following the eruption there were numerous reports of resuspended volcanic ash made by weather observers on the ground. A saltation sensor (SENSIT) and an op...

Iceland is a highly active source of natural dust. Icelandic dust has the potential to affect directly the climate via dust-radiation interaction, and indirectly via dust-cloud interaction, snow/ice albedo effect and impacts on biogeochemical cycles. The impacts of Icelandic dust depend on its mineralogical and chemical composition. However, lack o...

Amongst the most significant extreme meteorological phenomena are the Sand and Dust Storms (SDS). Owing to significant amounts of airborne mineral dust particles generated during these events, SDS have impacts on climate, the environment, human health, and many socioeconomic sectors (e.g. aviation, solar energy management). Many studies and reports...

Ice-nucleating particles (INPs) have the potential to remove much of the liquid water in climatically important mid- to high-latitude shallow supercooled clouds, markedly reducing their albedo. The INP sources at these latitudes are very poorly defined, but it is known that there are substantial dust sources across the high latitudes, such as Icela...

The heterogeneous degradation of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) on five samples of natural Icelandic volcanic particles has been investigated. Laboratory experiments were carried out under simulated atmospheric conditions using a coated wall flow tube (CWFT). The CWFT reactor was coupled to a blue light nitrogen oxides analyzer (NOx analyzer), and a long p...

High Latitude Dust (HLD) contributes 5% to the global dust budget, but HLD measurements are sparse. Dust observations from Iceland provide dust aerosol distributions during the Arctic winter for the first time, profiling dust storms as well as clean air conditions. Five winter dust storms were captured during harsh conditions. Mean number concentra...

In April and May 2010 the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull experienced an explosive eruption that led to substantial ashfall across the central-southern parts of the island. The resulting ash deposits covered Eyjafjallajökull, Mýrdalsjökull and parts of Vatnajökull ice caps. In order to quantify the influence of these deposits on albedo, we analy...

V-dust (v-dust) is a highly variable source of natural particles in the atmosphere, and during the period of high volcanic activity it can provide a large surface for heterogeneous interactions with other atmospheric compounds. Icelandic v-dust was chosen as a case study due to frequency of volcanic eruptions and high aeolian activity in the area....

In this work we use chemical fingerprints as characteristics ratios of specific crustal elements Ca/Al, Fe/Al, K/Al, Mg/Al, Mn/Al, Ca/Fe, and Mg/Fe to investigate the long-range transport of volcanic aerosols from Iceland. Volcanic dust enters the atmosphere during suspension processes from Icelandic deserts, but mainly from the dust hot spots in r...

This chapter provides recommendations from the HarmoSnow field campaigns, including details of three water equivalent of snow cover intercomparison experiments. Crucial insights from the field, as well as lessons learnt from measurements performed with different instruments by several observers, are discussed.

The Nordic Centre of Excellence CRAICC (Cryosphere–Atmosphere Interactions in a Changing Arctic Climate), funded by NordForsk in the years 2011–2016, is the largest joint Nordic research and innovation initiative to date, aiming to strengthen research and innovation regarding climate change issues in the Nordic region. CRAICC gathered more than 100...

High latitude dust is an important contributor to the global dust cycle, which affects the radiative balance of the atmosphere. The frequency and severity of dust events are driven by variables such as wind speed, precipitation, temperature, surface cover type, and volcanic activity. The extent of impact of glacial retreat is yet to be determined,...

Several important ice-free areas (e.g., Seymour Island, Cape Lamb on Vega Island, Terrapin Hill) are located in the Eastern Antarctic Peninsula region. The largest of these ice-free areas can be found on the Ulu Peninsula, James Ross Island, where this study was undertaken. The Ulu Peninsula covers an area of 312 km², and has been found to be an im...

This work aims to identify the geochemical and mineralogical markers of Icelandic dust and to differentiate it from the dust of local origin deposited at the Ny-Ålesund station. We characterized representative sediment samples from Iceland and Svalbard and compared them to a set of aerosol samples collected in Ny-Ålesund to check the existence and...

The Nordic Centre of Excellence CRAICC (CRyosphere-Atmosphere Interactions in a Changing Arctic Climate), funded by NordForsk in the years 2011–2016, was the largest joint Nordic research and innovation initiative to date, aiming to strengthen research and innovation regarding climate change issues in the Nordic Region. CRAICC gathered more than 10...

Proceedings of the CRAICC Final Annual Meeting 2016, Rep. Ser. Aer. Sci, 182, 74 - 76, 2016

O. MEINANDER1, G. DE LEEUW1 A. VIRKKULA1, J. PAATERO1, P. DAGSSON-WALDHAUSEROVA2,3, M. AURELA1, E. ASMI1, J. SVENSSON1, M. VESTENIUS1, P. RÄISÄNEN1, A. HIENOLA1, H.-R. HANNULA4, S. MANNINEN5, M. RUPPEL5, A. KORHOLA5, J. TISSARI6, O. SIPPULA6, P. TIITTA6, M. IHALAINEN6, H. LAMBERG6, K. KUPIAINEN7, M. SAVOLAHTI7, V.-V. PAUNU7, N. KARVOSENOJA7, Procee...

Icelandic dust sources are known to be highly active, yet there exist few model simulations of Icelandic dust that could be used to assess its impacts on the environment. We here present estimates of dust emission and transport in Iceland over 27 years (1990–2016) based on FLEXDUST and FLEXPART simulations and meteorological re-analysis data. Simul...

The aim of the work was to compare the influence of a beech (B) and a spruce stand (S) on the accumulation and melting of snow cover in comparison to an open area (O). The measurements were performed in winter seasons from 2012/13 to 2014/15 in the Hučava catchment, Poľana Biosphere Reserve (BR). We monitored hydrological and physical parameters of...

Icelandic dust sources are known to be highly active, yet there exist few model simulations of Icelandic dust that could be used to assess its impacts on the environment. We here present estimates of dust emission and transport in Iceland over 27 years (1990–2016) based on FLEXDUST & FLEXPART simulations and meteorological re-analysis data. Simulat...

We present in situ balloon-borne measurements of aerosols in a volcanic plume made during the Holuhraun eruption (Iceland) in January 2015. The balloon flight intercepted a young plume at 8 km distance downwind from the crater, where the plume is ~15 minutes of age. The balloon carried a novel miniature optical particle counter LOAC (Light Optical...

In the companion (Part I) paper, we have described and evaluated a new versatile optical particle counter/sizer named LOAC (Light Optical Aerosol Counter), based on scattering measurements at angles of 12 and 60°. That allows for some typology identification of particles (droplets, carbonaceous, salts, and mineral dust) in addition to size-segregat...

Particulate matter mass concentrations and size fractions of PM1, PM2.5, PM4, PM10, and PM15 measured in transversal horizontal profile of two dust storms in southwestern Iceland are presented. Images from a camera network were used to estimate the visibility and spatial extent of measured dust events. Numerical simulations were used to calculate t...

Soot has a pronounced effect on the cryosphere and experiments are still needed to reduce the associated uncertainties. This work presents a series of experiments to address this issue, with soot being deposited onto a natural snow surface after which the albedo changes were monitored. The albedo reduction was the most pronounced for the snow wi...

In our paper we deal with the changes in the rainfall interception process of a climax spruce forest in the growing season (approximately from May to October) during its die-back. Experimental data were collected at the research plot of Červenec situated in the West Tatras at an elevation of 1,420 m a.s.l. in the years from 2013 to 2015. Net precip...

The study of aerosols in the troposphere and in the stratosphere is of major importance both for climate and air quality studies. Among the numerous instruments available, optical aerosol particles counters (OPCs) provide the size distribution in diameter range from about 100 nm to a few tens of µm. Most of them are very sensitive to the nature of...

Iceland has the largest area of volcaniclastic sandy desert on Earth or 22,000km2. The sand has been mostly produced by glacio-fluvial processes, leaving behind fine-grained unstable sediments which are later re-distributed by repeated aeolian events. Volcanic eruptions add to this pool of unstable sediments, often from subglacial eruptions. Icelan...

In the Arctic region, Iceland is an important source of dust due to ash production from volcanic eruptions. In addition, dust is resuspended from the surface into the atmosphere as several dust storms occur each year. During volcanic eruptions and dust storms, material is deposited on the glaciers where it influences their energy balance. The effec...

Copyright © 2016 American Association for Aerosol Research

In order to quantify the effects of absorbing contaminants on snow, a series of spectral reflectance measurements were conducted. Chimney soot, volcanic sand, and glaciogenic silt were deposited on a natural snow surface in a controlled way as a part of the Soot on Snow (SoS) campaign. The bidirectional reflectance factors of these soiled surfaces...

In order to quantify the effects of absorbing contaminants on snow, a series of spectral reflectance measurements were conducted. Chimney soot, volcanic sand, and glaciogenic silt were deposited on a natural snow surface in a controlled way as a part of the Soot on Snow (SoS) campaign. The bidirectional reflectance factors of these soiled surfaces...

In order to quantify the effects of absorbing material on snow and define its contribution to climate change, we have conducted a series of dedicated bidirectional reflectance measurements. Chimney soot, volcanic sand, and glaciogenic silt were deposited on snow in a controlled way [1, 2]. The bidirectional reflectance factors of these targets and...

Iceland is an active source of dust originating from glaciogenic and volcanic sediments. The frequency of days with dust suspension exceeded 34 dust days annually in 1949-2011. About 4.5 million tons of dust is annually distributed over local Icelandic glaciers, but dust is likely deposited on the Arctic glaciers as well. Dust events in NE Iceland...

Iceland is an active dust source in the high-latitude cold region. About 50% of the annual dust events in the southern part of Iceland take place at sub-zero temperatures or in winter, when dust may be mixed with snow. We investigated one winter dust event that occurred in March 2013. It resulted in a several mm thick dark layer of dust deposited o...

Light-absorbing impurities affect snow and ice via a decrease in albedo and a consequent disturbance to the radiative energy balance. Experimentally, these matters have only been examined in a few studies. Here we present results from a series of experiments in which we deposited different soot concentrations onto natural snow in different 5 region...