Aerosols have both direct and indirect effects on meteorology, atmospheric chemistry, human health, and ultimately the global energy budget with dust being a major contributor to the atmospheric aerosol burden. A great effort has been made to characterize the sources and mobilization of dust, however, current models still show large uncertainty as the modeling of mineral dust in the atmosphere is complex. The FENGSHA dust emission model, implemented into the operational NOAA National Air Quality Forecast Capability (NAQFC), and the new Global Ensemble Forecast System with Aerosols (GEFS-Aerosols), is a flexible emission model capable of predicting dust emissions across forecast scales. Here we will discuss the history and development of the FENGSHA dust emission scheme and its applications in the various operational and developmental UFS applications as well as tangential developments in tracking the erodibility of soils and the dust record.
Dr. Barry Baker is a physical research scientist at NOAA Air Resources Laboratory. He received his PhD from the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) and later received a postdoctoral fellowship through the National Research Council. He is now also on the global steering committee for the WMO Sand and Dust Storm group.
