The SOWLETS Campaign: an Examination of Local Incinerator Plume in O3/SO2 using Sondes and a 4-wavelengths lidar

The Langley Mobile O3 Lidar (LMOL) was stationed at NASA's Langley Research Center for the initiation of the SO2-O3 Water Land Environment study (SOWLETS). The primary focus of the campaign was to examine the capabilities of a novel four-wavelength detection technique to measure the concentrations of sulfur dioxide (SO2) and ozone (O3).
This lidar principle is built upon the standard DIAL: while 3 wavelengths would be enough to retrieve both SO2 and O3, the 4 wavelengths allow to provide data on aerosol backscattering. In parallel, SO2-O3 sondes were launched and installed in the nearby NASA Landing and Impact research facility, providing validation for the lidar's atmospheric measurements.
The exact location of the lidar, near the NASA/CAPABLE site, was optimized to intercept the plume emissions from a proximate incinerator facility using historical weather data for the month of the campaign.

Overall, this campaign and its observations shows the promise of this new kind of lidar to better understand and validate the observations by NASA/TEMPO ("Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution").