Greenhouse effect of NOx

Through various processes the nitrogen oxides (NO,) interact: with trace gases in the troposphere and stratosphere which do absorb in the spectral range relevant to the greenhouse effect (infrared wavelengths). The net effect is an enhancement of the greenhouse effect. The catalytic role of NO, in the production of tropospheric ozone provides the most prominent contribution. The global waming potential is estimated as GWP (NOx) = 30 - 33 and 7 - 10 for the respective time horizons of 20 and 100 years, and is thereby comparable to chat of methane. NO, emissions in rural areas of anthropogenically influenced regions, or those in the vicinity of the tropopause caused by air traffic, cause the greenhouse effectivity to be substantially more intense. We estimate an additional 5 - 23 % for Germany's contribution to the anthropogenic greenhouse effect as a result of the indirect greenhouse effects stemming from NO,. Furthermore, a small and still inaccurately defined amount of the deposited NO, which has primarily been converted into nitrates is again released from the soil into the atmosphere in the form of the long-lived greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N2O). Thus, anchropogenically induced NOx emissions contribute to enhanced greenhouse effect and to stratospheric ozone depletion in the time scale of more than a century.