What caused large ozone variabilities in three megacity clusters in eastern China during 2015–2020?

Abstract. Due to a robust emission control policy, significant reductions in major air pollutants, such as PM2.5, SO2, NO2, and CO, were observed in China between 2015 and 2020. On the other hand, during the same period, there was a notable increase in ozone (O3) concentrations, making it a prominent air pollutant in eastern China. The annual mean concentration of maximum daily 8 h average (MDA8) O3 exhibited alarming linear increases of 2.4, 1.1, and 2.0 ppb yr−1 (ppb is for parts per billion) in three megacity clusters: Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei (BTH), the Yangtze River Delta (YRD), and the Pearl River Delta (PRD), respectively. Meanwhile, there was a significant 3-fold increase in the number of O3-exceeding days, defined as MDA8 O3 > 75 ppb. Our analysis indicated that the upward increases in the annual mean concentration of MDA8 were primarily driven by the rise in consecutive O3-exceeding days. There were expansions of high O3 in urban centers to rural areas accompanied by a saturation effect so that MDA8 O3 concentrations at the high-O3 stations in 2015 remained nearly constant at 100 ppb. Last, we found a close association between O3 episodes with 4 or more consecutive O3-exceeding days and the position and strength of tropical cyclones (TCs) in the northwest Pacific and the West Pacific subtropical high (WPSH). The TC and WPSH contributed to meteorological conditions characterized by clear skies, subsiding air motion, high vertical stability in the lower troposphere, increased solar radiation, and a positive temperature anomaly at the surface. These favorable meteorological conditions greatly facilitated the formation of O3. Thus, we propose that the worsening O3 increases observed in the BTH, YRD, and PRD regions from 2015 to 2020 can be mostly attributed to enhanced photochemical O3 production resulting from an increased occurrence of meteorological conditions with high solar radiation and positive temperature anomalies under the influence of the WPSH and TCs.