10th International Aerosol Conference September 2 - September 7, 2018 America's Center Convention Complex St. Louis, Missouri, USA
Abstract View
Use of Mobile Air Quality Measurements to Investigate Highly Spatially Resolved Particulate Matter Concentrations in Houston
BLAKE ACTKINSON, Henry Wallace, Robert Griffin, Katie Moore, Ramon Alvarez, Grace Lewis, Elena Craft, Kyle Messier, David Miller, Joshua Apte, Rice University
Abstract Number: 1462 Working Group: Instrumentation
Abstract Recent work has elucidated the capability of mobile air quality measurements to map air pollution concentration profiles on fine (<100s meters) spatial scales. Here, we evaluate the efficacy of using Google Street-View cars as a means of determining fine spatial profiles of pollutants in Houston. In addition to a suite of trace gas measurements, data collected includes mass concentrations of black carbon and total fine aerosol (PM2.5) and number concentrations of ultrafine particles (UFP).
The Google Street-View cars were deployed from July 2017 through March 2018 across 35 different Houston census tract polygons representing a range of geographic locations, emission sources, air quality monitor deployment, and socioeconomic status of residents. Median values of mean air pollutant concentrations were mapped in 30-meter segments throughout the cars’ drive paths. In addition, to identifying the influence from point sources such as cement batch plants, metal recyclers, and oil and gas operations, data collected were compared to fixed monitor data to investigate the representativeness of the fixed monitoring data. The collected data also were used to estimate the background pollutant concentrations spatially and to investigate the temporal nature of the fine-scale pollutant maps (weekend versus weekday, mid-day versus early morning or evening). Future work will incorporate these data into analyses on air pollution health effects.