Stable Isotopes of Carbon Monoxide in an Urban Environment: A Study at Indianapolis, IN as part of the INFLUX Campaign

Abstract:

We have developed a new system capable of measuring stable isotopes of carbon monoxide (CO) in small atmospheric samples. Measurements at 3 tall tower sites in Indianapolis, IN, USA have been ongoing since July 2013 as part of the INdianapolis FLUX (INFLUX) project. These three towers consist of an upwind, or background site, a site in the urban center, and a site on the downwind edge of the city. The tower collections are discrete, one hour integrated samples taken using NOAA’s Portable Flask Package system. These sites have been measured for CO mole fraction, ¹³CO, and C¹⁸O approximately 6 times per month.

We present a time series of data from these three sites, as well as a source analysis of the CO produced during the winter months (the winter data allow the use of several simplifying assumptions). We have identified mobile (vehicular) fossil fuel emissions as the only clearly significant wintertime source of CO, and quantified the stable isotopic signature of that source. We also present data from a traffic study done in March of 2015. A vehicle-based collection system was used for this study, and both continuous CO mole fraction and discrete CO mole fraction, ¹³CO, and C¹⁸O measurements were made. The results for CO stable isotopes are consistent with the vehicular emission CO isotopic signatures inferred from the tower samples.