Monitoring Air Quality in Urban Areas

This paper presents the approach used to develop the information chain required to reach the objectives of the EEA Grants� RokidAIR project in two Romanian cities i.e., Targoviste and Ploiesti. It describes the PM2.5 monitoring infrastructure and architecture to the web-based GIS platform, the early warning system and the decision support system, and finally, the linking of air pollution to health effects in children. In addition, it shows the analysis performance of the designed system to process the collected time series from various data sources using the benzene concentrations monitored in Ploiesti. Moreover, this paper suggests that biomarkers, mobile technologies, and Citizens� Observatories are potential perspectives to improve data coverage by the provision of near-real-time air quality maps, and provide personal exposure and health assessment results, enabling the citizens� engagement and behavioural change. This paper also addresses new fields in nature-based solutions to improve air quality, and studies on air pollution and its mental health effects in the urban areas of Romania.

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Morpho-Physio-Biochemical Attributes of Roadside Trees as Potential Tools for Biomonitoring of Air Quality and Environmental Health in Urban Areas

Land ◽

10.3390/land10030236 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (3) ◽

pp. 236

Author(s):

Ha Na You ◽

Myeong Ja Kwak ◽

Sun Mi Je ◽

Jong Kyu Lee ◽

Yea Ji Lim ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Air Pollution ◽

Air Quality ◽

Environmental Health ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Biochemical Parameters ◽

Lipid Peroxide ◽

Platanus Occidentalis ◽

Physiological Variables ◽

Sources Of Pollution ◽

Species Specific

Environmental pollution is an important issue in metropolitan areas, and roadside trees are directly affected by various sources of pollution to which they exhibit numerous responses. The aim of the present study was to identify morpho-physio-biochemical attributes of maidenhair tree (Ginkgo biloba L.) and American sycamore (Platanus occidentalis L.) growing under two different air quality conditions (roadside with high air pollution, RH and roadside with low air pollution, RL) and to assess the possibility of using their physiological and biochemical parameters as biomonitoring tools in urban areas. The results showed that the photosynthetic rate, photosynthetic nitrogen-use efficiencies, and photochromic contents were generally low in RH in both G. biloba and P. occidentalis. However, water-use efficiency and leaf temperature showed high values in RH trees. Among biochemical parameters, in G. biloba, the lipid peroxide content was higher in RH than in RL trees, but in P. occidentalis, this content was lower in RH than in RL trees. In both species, physiological activities were low in trees planted in areas with high levels of air pollution, whereas their biochemical and morphological variables showed different responses to air pollution. Thus, we concluded that it is possible to determine species-specific physiological variables affected by regional differences of air pollution in urban areas, and these findings may be helpful for monitoring air quality and environmental health using trees.

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A decision support tool for the assessment of air quality in urban areas: An application for Athens, Greece

Toxicological and Environmental Chemistry ◽

10.1080/02772249909358685 ◽

1999 ◽

Vol 69 (1-2) ◽

pp. 31-42

Author(s):

D. Deligiorgi ◽

C. Cartalis ◽

G. Kouroupetroglou ◽

C. Moutselos ◽

E. Kambitsi

Keyword(s):

Decision Support ◽

Air Quality ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Decision Support Tool ◽

Support Tool

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Modelling the impact of megacities on local, regional and global tropospheric ozone and the deposition of nitrogen species

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ◽

10.5194/acp-13-12215-2013 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 13 (24) ◽

pp. 12215-12231 ◽

Cited By ~ 14

Author(s):

Z. S. Stock ◽

M. R. Russo ◽

T. M. Butler ◽

A. T. Archibald ◽

M. G. Lawrence ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Air Quality ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Climate Model ◽

Surface Ozone ◽

Global Scale ◽

Chemical Environment ◽

Ozone Production ◽

The Uk ◽

The Impact ◽

Local Emissions

Abstract. We examine the effects of ozone precursor emissions from megacities on present-day air quality using the global chemistry–climate model UM-UKCA (UK Met Office Unified Model coupled to the UK Chemistry and Aerosols model). The sensitivity of megacity and regional ozone to local emissions, both from within the megacity and from surrounding regions, is important for determining air quality across many scales, which in turn is key for reducing human exposure to high levels of pollutants. We use two methods, perturbation and tagging, to quantify the impact of megacity emissions on global ozone. We also completely redistribute the anthropogenic emissions from megacities, to compare changes in local air quality going from centralised, densely populated megacities to decentralised, lower density urban areas. Focus is placed not only on how changes to megacity emissions affect regional and global NOx and O3, but also on changes to NOy deposition and to local chemical environments which are perturbed by the emission changes. The perturbation and tagging methods show broadly similar megacity impacts on total ozone, with the perturbation method underestimating the contribution partially because it perturbs the background chemical environment. The total redistribution of megacity emissions locally shifts the chemical environment towards more NOx-limited conditions in the megacities, which is more conducive to ozone production, and monthly mean surface ozone is found to increase up to 30% in megacities, depending on latitude and season. However, the displacement of emissions has little effect on the global annual ozone burden (0.12% change). Globally, megacity emissions are shown to contribute ~3% of total NOy deposition. The changes in O3, NOx and NOy deposition described here are useful for quantifying megacity impacts and for understanding the sensitivity of megacity regions to local emissions. The small global effects of the 100% redistribution carried out in this study suggest that the distribution of emissions on the local scale is unlikely to have large implications for chemistry–climate processes on the global scale.

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Regional Scale Impact of the COVID-19 Lockdown on Air Quality: Gaseous Pollutants in the Po Valley, Northern Italy

Atmosphere ◽

10.3390/atmos12020264 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (2) ◽

pp. 264 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Giovanni Lonati ◽

Federico Riva

Keyword(s):

Air Quality ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Regional Scale ◽

High Volume ◽

Ambient Air ◽

Northern Italy ◽

Traffic Emissions ◽

Gaseous Pollutants ◽

Po Valley ◽

Concentration Levels

The impact of the reduced atmospheric emissions due to the COVID-19 lockdown on ambient air quality in the Po Valley of Northern Italy was assessed for gaseous pollutants (NO2, benzene, ammonia) based on data collected at the monitoring stations distributed all over the area. Concentration data for each month of the first semester of 2020 were compared with those of the previous six years, on monthly, daily, and hourly bases, so that pre, during, and post-lockdown conditions of air quality could be separately analyzed. The results show that, as in many other areas worldwide, the Po Valley experienced better air quality during 2020 spring months for NO2 and benzene. In agreement with the reductions of nitrogen oxides and benzene emissions from road traffic, estimated to be −35% compared to the regional average, the monthly mean concentration levels for 2020 showed reductions in the −40% to −35% range compared with the previous years, but with higher reductions, close to −50%, at high-volume-traffic sites in urban areas. Conversely, NH3 ambient concentration levels, almost entirely due the emissions of the agricultural sector, did not show any relevant change, even at high-volume-traffic sites in urban areas. These results point out the important role of traffic emissions in NO2 and benzene ambient levels in the Po Valley, and confirm that this region is a rather homogeneous air basin with urban area hot-spots, the contributions of which add up to a relatively high regional background concentration level. Additionally, the relatively slow response of the air quality levels to the sudden decrease of the emissions due to the lockdown shows that this region is characterized by a weak exchange of the air masses that favors both the build-up of atmospheric pollutants and the development of secondary formation processes. Thus, air quality control strategies should aim for structural interventions intended to reduce traffic emissions at the regional scale and not only in the largest urban areas.

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Contribution of Local and Transboundary Air Pollution to the Urban Air Quality of Fukuoka, Japan

Atmosphere ◽

10.3390/atmos12040431 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (4) ◽

pp. 431

Author(s):

Ayako Yoshino ◽

Akinori Takami ◽

Keiichiro Hara ◽

Chiharu Nishita-Hara ◽

Masahiko Hayashi ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Air Pollution ◽

Air Quality ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Air Pollutants ◽

Regional Scale ◽

Gaseous Species ◽

Transboundary Air Pollution ◽

Local Air Pollution ◽

The City

Transboundary air pollution (TAP) and local air pollution (LAP) influence the air quality of urban areas. Fukuoka, located on the west side of Japan and affected by TAP from the Asian continent, is a unique example for understanding the contribution of LAP and TAP. Gaseous species and particulate matter (PM) were measured for approximately three weeks in Fukuoka in the winter of 2018. We classified two distinctive periods, LAP and TAP, based on wind speed. The classification was supported by variations in the concentration of gaseous species and by backward trajectories. Most air pollutants, including NOx and PM, were high in the LAP period and low in the TAP period. However, ozone was the exception. Therefore, our findings suggest that reducing local emissions is necessary. Ozone was higher in the TAP period, and the variation in ozone concentration was relatively small, indicating that ozone was produced outside of the city and transported to Fukuoka. Thus, air pollutants must also be reduced at a regional scale, including in China.

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Temporal patterns and trends of surface ozone concentrations over Portugal

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-5119 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Carla Gama ◽

Alexandra Monteiro ◽

Myriam Lopes ◽

Ana Isabel Miranda

Keyword(s):

Air Quality ◽

Iberian Peninsula ◽

Human Health ◽

Temporal Variability ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Surface Ozone ◽

Quality Data ◽

Ozone Concentrations ◽

Long Term Study

Tropospheric ozone (O3) is a critical pollutant over the Mediterranean countries, including Portugal, due to systematic exceedances to the thresholds for the protection of human health. Due to the location of Portugal, on the Atlantic coast at the south-west point of Europe, the observed O3 concentrations are very much influenced not only by local and regional production but also by northern mid-latitudes background concentrations. Ozone trends in the Iberian Peninsula were previously analysed by Monteiro et al. (2012), based on 10-years of O3 observations. Nevertheless, only two of the eleven background monitoring stations analysed in that study are located in Portugal and these two stations are located in Porto and Lisbon urban areas. Although during pollution events O3 levels in urban areas may be high enough to affect human health, the highest concentrations are found in rural locations downwind from the urban and industrialized areas, rather than in cities. This happens because close to the sources (e.g., in urban areas) freshly emitted NO locally scavenges O3. A long-term study of the spatial and temporal variability and trends of the ozone concentrations over Portugal is missing, aiming to answer the following questions:-&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160; What is the temporal variability of ozone concentrations?-&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160; Which trends can we find in observations?-&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160; How were the ozone spring maxima concentrations affected by the COVID-19 lockdown during spring 2020?In this presentation, these questions will be answered based on the statistical analysis of O3 concentrations recorded within the national air quality monitoring network between 2005 and 2020 (16 years). The variability of the surface ozone concentrations over Portugal, on the timescales from diurnal to annual, will be presented and discussed, taking into account the physical and chemical processes that control that variability. Using the TheilSen function from the OpenAir package for R (Carslaw and Ropkins 2012), which quantifies monotonic trends and calculates the associated p-value through bootstrap simulations, O3 concentration long-term trends will be estimated for the different regions and environments (e.g., rural, urban).&#160; Moreover, taking advantage of the unique situation provided by the COVID-19 lockdown during spring 2020, when the government imposed mandatory confinement and citizens movement restriction, leading to a reduction in traffic-related atmospheric emissions, the role of these emissions on ozone levels during the spring period will be studied and presented.&#160;Carslaw and Ropkins, 2012. Openair&#8212;an R package for air quality data analysis. Environ. Model. Softw. 27-28,52-61. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2011.09.008Monteiro et al., 2012. Trends in ozone concentrations in the Iberian Peninsula by quantile regression and clustering. Atmos. Environ. 56, 184-193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2012.03.069

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Air Quality Monitoring in Urban Areas Using in-Situ and Satellite Data Within Era-Planet Project

IGARSS 2018 - 2018 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium ◽

10.1109/igarss.2018.8518368 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Andrii Shelestov ◽

Andrii Kolotii ◽

Mykola Lavreniuk ◽

Kyrylo Medyanovskyi ◽

Vladimir Vasiliev ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Air Quality ◽

Satellite Data ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Quality Monitoring ◽

Air Quality Monitoring

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Evaluation of dust and trace metal estimates from the Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) model version 5.0

Geoscientific Model Development ◽

10.5194/gmd-6-883-2013 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 6 (4) ◽

pp. 883-899 ◽

Cited By ~ 116

Author(s):

K. W. Appel ◽

G. A. Pouliot ◽

H. Simon ◽

G. Sarwar ◽

H. O. T. Pye ◽

...

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Air Quality ◽

Trace Metals ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Temporal Distribution ◽

Air Pollutant ◽

Eastern United States ◽

Air Quality Model ◽

Quality Model ◽

Model Version

Abstract. The Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) model is a state-of-the-science air quality model that simulates the emission, transformation, transport, and fate of the many different air pollutant species that comprise particulate matter (PM), including dust (or soil). The CMAQ model version 5.0 (CMAQv5.0) has several enhancements over the previous version of the model for estimating the emission and transport of dust, including the ability to track the specific elemental constituents of dust and have the model-derived concentrations of those elements participate in chemistry. The latest version of the model also includes a parameterization to estimate emissions of dust due to wind action. The CMAQv5.0 modeling system was used to simulate the entire year 2006 for the continental United States, and the model estimates were evaluated against daily surface-based measurements from several air quality networks. The CMAQ modeling system overall did well replicating the observed soil concentrations in the western United States (mean bias generally around ±0.5 μg m−3); however, the model consistently overestimated the observed soil concentrations in the eastern United States (mean bias generally between 0.5–1.5 μg m−3), regardless of season. The performance of the individual trace metals was highly dependent on the network, species, and season, with relatively small biases for Fe, Al, Si, and Ti throughout the year at the Interagency Monitoring of Protected Visual Environments (IMPROVE) sites, while Ca, K, and Mn were overestimated and Mg underestimated. For the urban Chemical Speciation Network (CSN) sites, Fe, Mg, and Mn, while overestimated, had comparatively better performance throughout the year than the other trace metals, which were consistently overestimated, including very large overestimations of Al (380%), Ti (370%) and Si (470%) in the fall. An underestimation of nighttime mixing in the urban areas appears to contribute to the overestimation of trace metals. Removing the anthropogenic fugitive dust (AFD) emissions and the effects of wind-blown dust (WBD) lowered the model soil concentrations. However, even with both AFD emissions and WBD effects removed, soil concentrations were still often overestimated, suggesting that there are other sources of errors in the modeling system that contribute to the overestimation of soil components. Efforts are underway to improve both the nighttime mixing in urban areas and the spatial and temporal distribution of dust-related emission sources in the emissions inventory.

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