Modeling wind erosion intermittency

To improve dust emission schemes in large scale transport models, we developed the first physically-based model simulating the full erosion process in a turbulent flow by resolving explicitly saltating particle trajectories and dust suspension, in presence of vegetation. The large-eddy simulation technic is used here to simulate the turbulent flow, allowing to solve explicitly the main wind gusts near the surface and so the intermittency of the erosion process. The model appeared able to reproduce the saltation intermittency as visualized through the presence of blowing sand structures near the surface, known as aeolian streamers observed on beaches during windy days. In presence of vegetation, the model further allowed us to investigate the sensitivity of sand erosion to the arrangement and morphology of plants (shrubs versus trees). More recently, we further used the model to reanalyze the dependence of the size distribution of the dust flux to the wind speed for idealized erosion events starting from an air free of dust. We found that the suspension of small dust (around 1 μm) can be a long nonstationary process (several hours depending on the wind intensity) due to the low deposition velocity of this particle size range. This leads to a continuous enrichment of the near-surface dust flux in small particles, enrichment that is enhanced with wind intensity, independently of the possible role of saltators. The model also showed that the size distribution and magnitude of dust fluxes at a few meters height differ from those of the emitted flux at the surface as particles start to be sorted through the deposition process within the saltation layer. This last result should be considered when evaluating or calibrating “physically based” dust emission schemes against measured near-surface turbulent diffusive dust fluxes