Relationship of ground-level aerosol concentration and atmospheric electric field at three observation sites in the Arctic, Antarctic and Europe

Abstract Aerosol number concentrations in the particle size range from ~ 10 nm to 1 μm and vertical electric field strength in the surface layer was measured between September 2012 and December 2013 at three observation sites: mid-latitude station Swider, Poland, and, for the first time, in Hornsund in the Arctic, Spitsbergen, and the Antarctic Arctowski station in the South Shetland Islands. The measurements of aerosol concentrations have been performed simultaneously with measurements of the electric field with the aim to assess the local effect of aerosol on the electric field E z near the ground at the three stations which at present form a network of atmospheric electricity observatories. Measurements have been made regardless of weather conditions at Swider and Arctowski station and mostly on fair-weather days at Hornsund station. The monthly mean particle number concentrations varied between 580 and 2100 particles cm − 3 at Arctowski, between 90 and 1270 particles cm − 3 in Hornsund, and between 6700 and 14,000 particles cm − 3 in the middle latitude station Swider. Average diurnal variations of the ground-level electric field E z and particle number concentrations in fair-weather conditions were independent of each other for Arctowski and Hornsund stations. At Swider station the diurnal variation is usually characterized by an increase of aerosol concentration in the evening which results in the increased electric field. The assumption of neglecting the influence of varying aerosol concentration on the variation of the electric field in the polar regions, often adopted in studies, is confirmed here by the observations at Arctowski and Hornsund. The results of aerosol observations are also compared with modelled aerosol concentrations for global atmospheric electric circuit models.