Wintertime Nitrous Oxide Emissions in the San Joaquin Valley of California Estimated from Aircraft Observations

Nitrous oxide (N2O) is a long-lived greenhouse gas that also destroys stratospheric ozone. N2O emissions are uncertain and characterized by high spatiotemporal variability, making individual observations difficult to upscale, especially in mixed land use source regions like the San Joaquin Valley (SJV) of California. Here, we calculate spatially integrated N2O emission rates using nocturnal and convective boundary-layer budgeting methods. We utilize vertical profile measurements from the NASA DISCOVER-AQ (Deriving Information on Surface Conditions from COlumn and VERtically Resolved Observations Relevant to Air Quality) campaign, which took place January–February, 2013. For empirical constraints on N2O source identity, we analyze N2O enhancement ratios with methane, ammonia, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide separately in the nocturnal boundary layer, nocturnal residual layer, and convective boundary layer. We find that an established inventory (EDGAR v4.3.2) underestimates N2O emissions by at least a factor of 2.5, that wintertime emissions from animal agriculture are important to annual totals, and that there is evidence for higher N2O emissions during the daytime than at night.