scholarly journals Spatial variation of airborne pollutant concentrations in Brisbane, Australia and its potential impact on population exposure assessment

2002 ◽  
Vol 36 (21) ◽  
pp. 3545-3555 ◽  
Author(s):  
L Morawska ◽  
D Vishvakarman ◽  
K Mengersen ◽  
S Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Variation ◽  
Exposure Assessment ◽  
Population Exposure ◽  
Pollutant Concentrations ◽  
Potential Impact ◽  
Airborne Pollutant

scholarly journals Environmental Health Surveillance System for a Population Using Advanced Exposure Assessment

Toxics ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wonho Yang ◽  
Jinhyeon Park ◽  
Mansu Cho ◽  
Cheolmin Lee ◽  
Jeongil Lee ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Air Pollution ◽  
Environmental Health ◽  
Exposure Assessment ◽  
Surveillance System ◽  
Health Surveillance ◽  
Health Concern ◽  
Population Exposure ◽  
Pollutant Concentrations ◽  
Air Pollution Exposure ◽  
Pollution Exposure

Human exposure to air pollution is a major public health concern. Environmental policymakers have been implementing various strategies to reduce exposure, including the 10th-day-no-driving system. To assess exposure of an entire population of a community in a highly polluted area, pollutant concentrations in microenvironments and population time–activity patterns are required. To date, population exposure to air pollutants has been assessed using air monitoring data from fixed atmospheric monitoring stations, atmospheric dispersion modeling, or spatial interpolation techniques for pollutant concentrations. This is coupled with census data, administrative registers, and data on the patterns of the time-based activities at the individual scale. Recent technologies such as sensors, the Internet of Things (IoT), communications technology, and artificial intelligence enable the accurate evaluation of air pollution exposure for a population in an environmental health context. In this study, the latest trends in published papers on the assessment of population exposure to air pollution were reviewed. Subsequently, this study proposes a methodology that will enable policymakers to develop an environmental health surveillance system that evaluates the distribution of air pollution exposure for a population within a target area and establish countermeasures based on advanced exposure assessment.

scholarly journals MobRISK: a model for assessing the exposure of road users to flash flood events

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (9) ◽  
pp. 1631-1651 ◽  
Author(s):  
Saif Shabou ◽  
Isabelle Ruin ◽  
Céline Lutoff ◽  
Samuel Debionne ◽  
Sandrine Anquetin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Exposure Assessment ◽  
Flash Flood ◽  
Activity Patterns ◽  
Traffic Load ◽  
Road User ◽  
Population Exposure ◽  
Flood Events ◽  
Population Mobility ◽  
Road Users ◽  
Adverse Weather

Abstract. Recent flash flood impact studies highlight that road networks are often disrupted due to adverse weather and flash flood events. Road users are thus particularly exposed to road flooding during their daily mobility. Previous exposure studies, however, do not take into consideration population mobility. Recent advances in transportation research provide an appropriate framework for simulating individual travel-activity patterns using an activity-based approach. These activity-based mobility models enable the prediction of the sequence of activities performed by individuals and locating them with a high spatial–temporal resolution. This paper describes the development of the MobRISK microsimulation system: a model for assessing the exposure of road users to extreme hydrometeorological events. MobRISK aims at providing an accurate spatiotemporal exposure assessment by integrating travel-activity behaviors and mobility adaptation with respect to weather disruptions. The model is applied in a flash-flood-prone area in southern France to assess motorists' exposure to the September 2002 flash flood event. The results show that risk of flooding mainly occurs in principal road links with considerable traffic load. However, a lag time between the timing of the road submersion and persons crossing these roads contributes to reducing the potential vehicle-related fatal accidents. It is also found that sociodemographic variables have a significant effect on individual exposure. Thus, the proposed model demonstrates the benefits of considering spatiotemporal dynamics of population exposure to flash floods and presents an important improvement in exposure assessment methods. Such improved characterization of road user exposures can present valuable information for flood risk management services.

scholarly journals Accurate, Low Cost PM2.5 Measurements Demonstrate the Large Spatial Variation in Wood Smoke Pollution in Regional Australia and Improve Modeling and Estimates of Health Costs

Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (8) ◽  
pp. 856
Author(s):  
Dorothy L. Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Variation ◽  
Real Time ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Health Costs ◽  
Wood Smoke ◽  
Population Exposure ◽  
South Wales ◽  
Smoke Pollution ◽  
Wood Heating ◽  
Regional Australia

The accuracy and utility of low-cost PM2.5 sensors was evaluated for measuring spatial variation and modeling population exposure to PM2.5 pollution from domestic wood-heating (DWH) in Armidale, a regional town in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, to obtain estimates of health costs and mortality. Eleven ‘PurpleAir’ (PA) monitors were deployed, including five located part of the time at the NSW government station (NSWGov) to derive calibration equations. Calibrated PA PM2.5 were almost identical to the NSWGov tapered element oscillating microbalance (TEOM) and Armidale Regional Council’s 2017 DustTrak measurements. Spatial variation was substantial. National air quality standards were exceeded 32 times from May–August 2018 at NSWGov and 63 times in one residential area. Wood heater use by about 50% of households increased estimated annual PM2.5 exposure by over eight micrograms per cubic meter, suggesting increased mortality of about 10% and health costs of thousands of dollars per wood heater per year. Accurate real-time community-based monitoring can improve estimates of exposure and avoid bias in estimating dose-response relationships. Efforts over the past decade to reduce wood smoke pollution proved ineffective, perhaps partly because some residents do not understand the health impacts or costs of wood-heating. Real-time Internet displays can increase awareness of DWH and bushfire pollution and encourage governments to develop effective policies to protect public health, as recommended by several recent studies in which wood smoke was identified as a major source of health-hazardous air pollution.

scholarly journals Exposure Indices of Extreme Wind-Driven Rain Events for Built Heritage

Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 163 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Allan Orr ◽  
May Cassar
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Exposure Assessment ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Prolonged Exposure ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Assessment Procedure ◽  
Statistical Confidence ◽  
Potential Impact ◽  
Rain Events ◽  
Two Stages

Building performance and material change of cultural heritage in urban areas are negatively impacted by wind-driven rain (WDR). The frequency and intensity of WDR exposure are modified by climate change. Current approaches to exposure assessment emphasise prolonged exposure. Here, we propose indices to represent the exposure of cultural heritage to extreme WDR events. The indices are derived in two stages: (1) time-binning of long-term exposure, and (2) statistical representation of the occurrence of infrequent but intense events by fitting to the Generalised Extreme Value (GEV) distribution. A comparison to an existing exposure assessment procedure demonstrates that the proposed indices better represent shorter, more intense, and more consistent WDR events. Indices developed for seasons had greater statistical confidence than those developed for annual exposure. One index is contextualised within a model of a gutter on a terraced building: this converts the index from a measure of exposure to potential impact. This evaluation demonstrated the importance of maintenance to reduce the potential impact of WDR events. This work has direct and indirect implications for developing robust assessment procedures for cultural heritage exposure to extreme weather events.

scholarly journals Changes in Air Quality during the First-Level Response to the Covid-19 Pandemic in Shanghai Municipality, China

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (21) ◽  
pp. 8887 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yang Bai ◽  
Yi Zhou ◽  
Juha M. Alatalo ◽  
Alice C. Hughes
Keyword(s):  
Air Quality ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Living Environment ◽  
Low Carbon ◽  
Pollutant Concentrations ◽  
Airborne Pollutant ◽  
Urban Population Growth ◽  
Shanghai Municipality

Ongoing rapid urban population growth world-wide has led to serious environmental problems that affect ecosystems and also lower the security and happiness of urban residents about their living environment. The most frequently reported negative impact is a deterioration in urban air quality. In this study, we performed a comprehensive assessment of the effects of the city lockdown policy in response to Covid-19 on air quality in Shanghai Municipality, China, and sought to identify a balance point between human activities and improving air quality. The first-level response (FLR) by Shanghai to control the spread of Covid-19 was to launch a lockdown, which remained in place from 24 January to 23 March, 2020. We compared airborne pollutant concentrations in different regions (downtown, suburbs) of Shanghai city in three periods (Pre-FLR, During-FLR, and Post-FLR) and in the corresponding periods in the previous year. The results showed that air quality improved significantly During-FLR compared with Pre-FLR, with the concentrations of PM2.5, PM10, SO2, NO2, and CO all decreasing significantly. The concentrations of all pollutants except O3 also decreased significantly compared with the same period in the previous year. There were also some differences in pollutant concentrations between the downtown region and the suburbs of Shanghai. However, we found that the concentrations of pollutants rebounded gradually when the restrictions on human activities ended after two months of lockdown. This study provides empirical evidence of the important effect of limiting human activities on air quality. For sustainable and clean future urban management in Shanghai and beyond, central government policy regulations requiring a low-carbon lifestyle and cleaner production in industries should be established.

scholarly journals Integrating Modes of Transport in a Dynamic Modelling Approach to Evaluate Population Exposure to Ambient NO2 and PM2.5 Pollution in Urban Areas

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (6) ◽  
pp. 2099 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Otto Paul Ramacher ◽  
Matthias Karl
Keyword(s):  
Air Pollution ◽  
Population Dynamics ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Road Traffic ◽  
Ambient Air ◽  
Traffic Emissions ◽  
Exposure Model ◽  
Population Exposure ◽  
Road Traffic Emissions ◽  
Pollutant Concentrations

To evaluate the effectiveness of alternative policies and measures to reduce air pollution effects on urban citizen’s health, population exposure assessments are needed. Due to road traffic emissions being a major source of emissions and exposure in European cities, it is necessary to account for differentiated transport environments in population dynamics for exposure studies. In this study, we applied a modelling system to evaluate population exposure in the urban area of Hamburg in 2016. The modeling system consists of an urban-scale chemistry transport model to account for ambient air pollutant concentrations and a dynamic time-microenvironment-activity (TMA) approach, which accounts for population dynamics in different environments as well as for infiltration of outdoor to indoor air pollution. We integrated different modes of transport in the TMA approach to improve population exposure assessments in transport environments. The newly developed approach reports 12% more total exposure to NO2 and 19% more to PM2.5 compared with exposure estimates based on residential addresses. During the time people spend in different transport environments, the in-car environment contributes with 40% and 33% to the annual sum of exposure to NO2 and PM2.5, in the walking environment with 26% and 30%, in the cycling environment with 15% and 17% and other environments (buses, subway, suburban, and regional trains) with less than 10% respectively. The relative contribution of road traffic emissions to population exposure is highest in the in-car environment (57% for NO2 and 15% for PM2.5). Results for population-weighted exposure revealed exposure to PM2.5 concentrations above the WHO AQG limit value in the cycling environment. Uncertainties for the exposure contributions arising from emissions and infiltration from outdoor to indoor pollutant concentrations range from −12% to +7% for NO2 and PM2.5. The developed “dynamic transport approach” is integrated in a computationally efficient exposure model, which is generally applicable in European urban areas. The presented methodology is promoted for use in urban mobility planning, e.g., to investigate on policy-driven changes in modal split and their combined effect on emissions, population activity and population exposure.

Mapping Drinking Water Systems for Population Exposure Assessment

2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
John Gerard William Minnery ◽  
Eugene Joh ◽  
Steven Johnson ◽  
Elaina MacIntyre ◽  
Sean Marshall ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drinking Water ◽  
Exposure Assessment ◽  
Water Systems ◽  
Population Exposure ◽  
Drinking Water Systems
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