Estimation of the ground-level ozone lifetime under rural conditions

The investigation of the ozone formation and destruction is of great interest because ozone influences the atmospheric chemistry and plays an important role in the climate change. The ground-level ozone lifetime alters depending on physical and chemical properties of the locality, meteorological factors, atmospheric turbulence, and other conditions. In this paper, the method of estimation of the ozone lifetime under rural conditions is presented. The discrepancy between the solar intensity as well as related turbulent air mixing maximum and the ozone concentration maximum during the day was used in the lifetime calculations. The solar radiation intensity and duration were taken as main parameters in calculating the ozone lifetime by estimating the ozone enrichment at the ground level. In the calculations the least-squares method was applied. The groundlevel average ozone lifetime was estimated to be in the range of 3.6–5.6 hours at the rural Preila station and in the range of2.8–3.9 hours at the Rūgsteliskis station during different seasons. Keywords: ozone lifetime, solar radiation intensity and duration, seasons, rural conditions