Dust radiative forcing and its impact on surface energy budget over West Africa

Dust is the dominant aerosol type over West Africa (WA), and therefore accurate simulation of dust impact is critical for better prediction of weather and climate change. The dust radiative forcing (DRF) is estimated using two sets of experiments in this study: one without and the other with dust aerosol and its feedbacks with the Weather Research and Forecasting with Chemistry model (WRF-Chem). Results show that DRF presents a net warming effect at the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) and in the atmosphere (ATM), and cooling at the surface (SFC). The net DRF over WA is estimated to be 9 W/m(2) at the TOA, 23 W/m(2) in the ATM, and − 13 W/m(2) at the SFC. Furthermore, dust-induced a reduction of sensible heat up to 24 W/m(2) and SFC temperature up to 2 °C cooling over WA, an increase of latent heat up to 12 W/m(2) over Sahara, a decrease up to 24 W/m(2) over the vegetated surfaces and an increase in the surface energy balance up to 12 W/m(2) over WA. The presence of dust significantly influences the surface energy budget over WA, suggesting that dust effects should be considered in more climate studies to improve the accuracy of climate predictions.