Surface ozone concentration and its behaviour with aerosols in the northwestern Himalaya, India

Surface ozone (O3), black carbon (BC) concentration and their relationship were established with PM10 and PM2.5 mass concentration at Mohal (31.9°N, 77.12°E, 1154 m amsl), a semi-urban site, in the Kullu valley of the northwestern part of the Indian Himalaya during January to December, 2010. O3 showed highest diurnal variation (84 ppb) during daytime and lowest (10 ppb) during late evening as well as early morning hours. The maximum concentration of O3 during summer was influenced by meteorological parameters, high insolation and backward airmass trajectories with transported pollutants. Rate of increase of O3 was observed as high as 2.92 ppb h−1 in October, followed by 2.73 ppb h−1 in March and 2.71 ppb h−1 in May. However, it was low 1.89 ppb h−1 in February. Monthly average concentration of O3 showed distinct seasonal variations with maximum in summer (55.9 ± 9.3 ppb in May) and minimum in winter (30.0 ± 6.2 ppb in January). Most of the O3 episodes were observed in summer during fair weather conditions like high solar flux (480–500 W m−2), relatively high temperature (22–24 °C) and negligible rainfall. By applying backward trajectory Hybrid Single Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory (HYSPLIT) model, the origin of the airmasses contributing to the background O3 concentration was investigated. O3 showed negative correlation with BC (r = −0.42). BC contributed 10–20% and 14–42% to the total aerosol mass concentration of PM10 and PM2.5 respectively which showed positive correlation (r = 0.65) with PM10 as well as PM2.5 aerosol mass concentration.

► Surface ozone behaviour with black carbon, PM10 and PM2.5 were measured first time in the northwestern Indian Himalayan region.
► The maximum photochemical build-up of surface ozone was 14.7 ppb in May.
► Highest hourly concentrations of surface ozone were measured up to 126 ppb in May.
► Black carbon showed negative correlation with surface ozone and positive with PM10 and PM2.5.
► Monthly variation of BC/PM10 and BC/PM2.5 was maximum in September.