The development and application of
chemistry transport models has a long tradition in and outside Europe. RIVM and
TNO have independently developed models to calculate the dispersion and
chemical transformation of air pollutants in the lower troposphere over Europe.
The two models are the TNO model LOTOS (Builtjes, 1992; Schaap et al., 2004a)
and the RIVM model EUROS (de Leeuw and van Rheineck Leyssius, 1990; van Loon, 1994, 1995; Matthijsen et al., 2002). LOTOS and EUROS were
originally developed and used as photo-oxidant models (Builtjes, 1992; Hass et
al., 1997; Hammingh et al, 2001, Roemer, 2003). During the last years attention
was given to simulate the inorganic secondary aerosols SO4, NH4
and NO3. (Schaap
et al., 2004a; Erisman and Schaap, 2004; Matthijsen et al., 2002) and
carbonaceous aerosols (Schaap et al., 2004b). The EUROS
model also contains the possibility to perform simulations for persistent
organic compounds (Jacobs and van Pul, 1996).
The two models have a similar structure and
comparable application areas. Hence, based on strategic and practical reasoning,
RIVM/MNP and TNO agreed to collaborate on the development of a single chemistry
transport model: LOTOS-EUROS. During 2004 the two models were unified which
resulted in a LOTOS-EUROS version 1.0 (Schaap et al., 2005). For 2005 a project
was defined to:
In this report we provide a documentation
of the LOTOS-EUROS model. The validation study, new developments and inclusion
of several model features will be described in a forthcoming report.
The model description in this report is
that of version 1.1, the model version operational at October, 1, 2005. This report
is not intended to describe a fixed and definite status, because a model such
as LOTOS-EUROS is under constant development. Hence, the documentation of the
model will be updated continuously and made available through the LOTOS-EUROS
website.