WRF model set-up analysis for air quality simulations in the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires

In this work, a high resolution WRF model is implemented in the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires for air quality purposes. Several sensitivity seven-day simulations of two weeks of winter and spring 2012 are performed, considering different combinations of microphysics, planetary boundary layer, surface layer, radiation and urban schemes. Four modelled surface hourly meteorological variables are statistically compared with those observed at six weather stations. Model performance depends on week, site and variable. An aggregated index is used to analyse the relative performance of different configurations. Results show that most schemes exhibit similar index values for wind speed, while configurations including the Noah-MP land surface scheme perform better for wind direction. For surface temperature, the use of urban canopy schemes with BouLac Planetary Boundary Layer scheme improves predictions during the spring week while a configuration with a more complex microphysics scheme has better performance during the winter week. The choice of a land scheme has a greater impact on the water vapor fraction without any improvement with the activation of urban schemes.