Project MEDUSE

the MEditerranean DUSt Experiment

Under the auspices of Project MEDUSE joint efforts were initiated on 1 March 1996 by a number of French, Greek, German, Icelandic and Italian laboratories to establish a prototype system for routine monitoring and prediction of the atmospheric transport of desert dust in the Mediterranean region, based on a numerical weather prediction model enhanced by a module for the simulation of the dust uptake, transport and wet and dry deposition. The dust simulations are being validated and further enhanced by means of an extensive measurement programme.

The dust monitoring and prediction system is used both for the simulation of past events and episodes and for experimental forecasts of the atmospheric transport and deposition of desert dust in the Mediterranean region. These regional forecasts are for typically 2½ days ahead. In addition to forming the basis for desert dust alerts, the forecasts are being made available to interested agencies and scientists via two Internet Websites, CCSEM.MRC Erice and HALO Reykjavi .

2 Progress and Experience

During the 18 months of this two year project, a comprehensive infrastructure for monitoring and prediction of the uptake, transport and deposition of desert dust in the Mediterranean region has gradually been built up. Operational dust predictions are being produced with a comprehensive set of image products being offered on a daily basis via the two project Websites, together with Meteosat-based images of the dust uptake (produced by LOA, University of Lille, France) as well as Meteosat-based vertically integrated dust loading images (CEA.CFR, Gif-Sur-Yvette, France) and corresponding  NOAA-based dust loading images (Univ. of the Aegean, Mytilene, Greece), all of which are used for model validation.

The main problem area has been the collection of measurement data for insertion into the Mediterranean Dust Data Base, which has been hampered both by the exceptionally low number of dust events in the Mediterranean region during the project period as well as unexpectedly time-consuming procedures for the quality control and calibration of such data. It is now expected that most measurement data will be made publicly available on CD-ROMs by the end of the initial project period (1 March 1998). The corresponding Mediterranean model data which include 3-dimensinal hourly dust concentration data and corresponding 6-hourly meteorological information are now becoming available on CD-ROMs on a month by month basis from May 1997 onwards, with the period November 1996-April 1997 to be covered retroactively by archival model reruns.

Acknowledgements

Project MEDUSE is supported by the Commission of the European Communities, Directorate General XII, under contract No. ENV4-CT95-0036 of the R&D Programme Environment and Climate 1994-1998. The project partners are: Mediterranean Research Centre, Erice (Italy), Division of Environmental and Analytical Chemistry, University of Heraklion (Greece), Centre des Faibles Radioactivités, Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, Gif-Sur-Yvette (France), Laboratoire de Modélisation du Climat et de l'Environnement, Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, CEA, Gif-Sur-Yvette (France), Department of Applied Physics, University of Athens (Greece), and Laboratoire Interuniversitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques CNRS - Univ. Paris VII & Paris XII Créteil (France) - associated partner, with the following project subcontractors: University of Hamburg, Institut für Anorganisches und Angewante Chemie (Germany), the University of Thessaloniki, Laboratory of Atmospheric Physics (Greece) and Association pour la Développement des Téchniques Nouvelles (France) and HALO, Reykjavik, Iceland.