Variability in aerosol optical properties over an urban site, Kanpur, in the Indo-Gangetic Plain: A case study of haze and dust events

•A one-year study of aerosol optical properties from an urban location, Kanpur, in the IGP•A large variability in absorption and scattering coefficient and SSA•Variability in AAE values suggest varying contributions from different emission sources of carbonaceous aerosols.

In this study, we report on three important optical parameters, viz. absorption and scattering coefficients (babs, bscat) and single scattering abledo (SSA) based on one-year chemical-composition data collected from an urban site (Kanpur) in the Indo-Gangetic-Plain (IGP) of northern India. In addition, absorption Ängstrom exponent (AAE) was also estimated in order to understand the wavelength dependence of absorption and to decipher emission sources of carbonaceous aerosols, in particular of black carbon. The absorption and scattering coefficients ranged between 8.3 to 95.2 Mm− 1 (1 Mm− 1 = 10− 6 m− 1) and 58 to 564 Mm− 1, respectively during the study period (for n = 66; from January 2007 to March 2008) and exhibit large seasonal variability with higher values occurring in winter and lower in the summer. Single scattering albedo varied from 0.65 to 0.92 whereas AAE ranged from 0.79 to 1.40 during pre-monsoon and winter seasons, respectively. The strong seasonal variability in aerosol optical properties is attributed to varying contribution from different emission sources of carbonaceous aerosols in the IGP. A case study of haze and dust events further provide information on extreme variability in aerosol optical parameters, particularly SSA, a crucial parameter in atmospheric radiative forcing estimates.