User's Guide for MetView: A Meteorological Display and Assessment Tool

MetView Version 2.0 is an easy-to-use model for accessing, viewing, and analyzing meteorological data. MetView provides both graphical and numerical displays of data. It can accommodate data from an extensive meteorological monitoring network that includes near-surface monitoring locations, instrumented towers, sodars, and meteorologist observations. MetView is used operationally for both routine, emergency response, and research applications at the U.S. Department of Energy's Hanford Site. At the Site's Emergency Operations Center, MetView aids in the access, visualization, and interpretation of real-time meteorological data. Historical data can also be accessed and displayed. Emergency response personnel at the Emergency Operations Center use MetView products in the formulation of protective action recommendations and other decisions. In the initial stage of an emergency, MetView can be operated using a very simple, five-step procedure. This first-responder procedure allows non-technical staff to rapidly generate meteorological products and disseminate key information. After first-responder information products are produced, the Emergency Operations Center's technical staff can conduct more sophisticated analyses using the model. This may include examining the vertical variation in winds, assessing recent changes in atmospheric conditions, evaluating atmospheric mixing rates, and forecasting changes in meteorological conditions. This user's guide provides easy-to-follow instructions for both first-responder and routine operation of the model. Examples, with explanations, are provided for each type of MetView output display. Information is provided on the naming convention, format, and contents of each type of meteorological data file used by the model area. This user's guide serves as a ready reference for experienced MetView users and a training manual for new users

Urban Dispersion Program: Urban Measurements Applied to Emergency Response

Air motions in and around cities are highly complex, and the increasing threat of harmful releases into urban atmospheres makes advancing the state-of-science of understanding and modeling atmospheric flows and dispersion in and around cities essential. The four-year Urban Dispersion Program (UDP) funded primarily by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency has recently been completed. The program’s primary focus was to conduct tracer and meteorological field studies in Manhattan to improve our understanding of flow and dispersion of airborne contaminants through and around the deep street canyons of New York City, including outdoor-indoor-subway exchange mechanisms. Additionally, urban dispersion models are being validated and first-responder guidance are being refined using data collected during the two UDP field studies. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory led several government laboratories, universities and private companies in conducting the two UDP field studies. The first study was a small-scale study that investigated dispersion in the immediate vicinity of the Madison Square Garden during March 2005 (MSG05), while the second UDP study was an extensive study conducted during August 2005 in Midtown Manhattan (MID05). A brief overview of the UDP field studies will be given followed by a discussion of some limitations of current urban models in simulating dispersion in urban areas. Some first-responder guidance based on findings from recent urban field studies will also be presented

Meteorological Integration for the Biological Warning and Incident Characterization (BWIC) System: General Guidance for BWIC Cities

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is responsible for developing systems to detect the release of aerosolized bioagents in urban environments. The system that accomplishes this, known as BioWatch, is a robust first-generation monitoring system. In conjunction with the BioWatch detection network, DHS has also developed a software tool for cities to use to assist in their response when a bioagent is detected. This tool, the Biological Warning and Incident Characterization (BWIC) System, will eventually be deployed to all BioWatch cities to aid in the interpretation of the public health significance of indicators from the BioWatch networks. BWIC consists of a set of integrated modules, including meteorological models, that estimate the effect of a biological agent on a city’s population once it has been detected. For the meteorological models in BWIC to successfully calculate the distribution of biological material, they must have as input accurate meteorological data, and wind fields in particular. The purpose of this document is to provide guidance for cities to use in identifying sources of good-quality local meteorological data that BWIC needs to function properly. This process of finding sources of local meteorological data, evaluating the data quality and gaps in coverage, and getting the data into BWIC, referred to as meteorological integration, is described. The good news for many cities is that meteorological measurement networks are becoming increasingly common. Most of these networks allow their data to be distributed in real time via the internet. Thus, cities will often only need to evaluate the quality of available measurements and perhaps add a modest number of stations where coverage is poor

Final Technical Report: Development of the DUSTRAN GIS-Based Complex Terrain Model for Atmospheric Dust Dispersion

Activities at U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) training and testing ranges can be sources of dust in local and regional airsheds governed by air-quality regulations. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory just completed a multi-year project to develop a fully tested and documented atmospheric dispersion modeling system (DUST TRANsport or DUSTRAN) to assist the DoD in addressing particulate air-quality issues at military training and testing ranges

Evaluation of nitrogen dioxide chemiluminescence monitors in a polluted urban environment

International audienceData from a recent field campaign in Mexico City are used to evaluate the performance of the EPA Federal Reference Method for monitoring the ambient concentrations of NO2. Measurements of NO2 from standard chemiluminescence monitors equipped with molybdenum oxide converters are compared with those from Tunable Infrared Laser Differential Absorption Spectroscopy (TILDAS) and Differential Optical Absorption Spectroscopy (DOAS) instruments. A significant interference in the chemiluminescence measurement is shown to account for up to 50% of ambient NO2 concentration during afternoon hours. As expected, this interference correlates well with non-NOx reactive nitrogen species (NOz) as well as with ambient O3 concentrations, indicating a photochemical source for the interfering species. A combination of ambient gas phase nitric acid and alkyl and multifunctional alkyl nitrates is deduced to be the primary cause of the interference. Observations at four locations at varying proximities to emission sources indicate that the percentage contribution of HNO3 to the interference decreases with time as the air parcel ages. Alkyl and multifunctional alkyl nitrate concentrations are calculated to reach concentrations as high as several ppb inside the city, on par with the highest values previously observed in other urban locations. Averaged over the MCMA-2003 field campaign, the chemiluminescence monitor interference resulted in an average measured NO2 concentration up to 22% greater than that from co-located spectroscopic measurements. Thus, this interference has the potential to initiate regulatory action in areas that are close to non-attainment and may mislead atmospheric photochemical models used to assess control strategies for photochemical oxidants

DUSTRAN 1.0 User’s Guide: A GIS-Based Atmospheric Dust Dispersion Modeling System

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory just completed a multi-year project to develop a fully tested and documented atmospheric dispersion modeling system (DUST TRANsport or DUSTRAN) to assist the U.S. Department of Defense in addressing particulate air quality issues at military training and testing ranges. This manual documents the DUSTRAN modeling system and includes installation instructions, a user’s guide, and detailed example tutorials

Seismic isolation of Advanced LIGO: Review of strategy, instrumentation and performance

The new generation of gravitational waves detectors require unprecedented levels of isolation from seismic noise. This article reviews the seismic isolation strategy and instrumentation developed for the Advanced LIGO observatories. It summarizes over a decade of research on active inertial isolation and shows the performance recently achieved at the Advanced LIGO observatories. The paper emphasizes the scientific and technical challenges of this endeavor and how they have been addressed. An overview of the isolation strategy is given. It combines multiple layers of passive and active inertial isolation to provide suitable rejection of seismic noise at all frequencies. A detailed presentation of the three active platforms that have been developed is given. They are the hydraulic pre-isolator, the single-stage internal isolator and the two-stage internal isolator. The architecture, instrumentation, control scheme and isolation results are presented for each of the three systems. Results show that the seismic isolation sub-system meets Advanced LIGO\u27s stringent requirements and robustly supports the operation of the two detectors

Advanced LIGO two-stage twelve-axis vibration isolation and positioning platform. Part 2: Experimental investigation and tests results

This paper presents the results of the past seven years of experimental investigation and testing done on the two-stage twelve-axis vibration isolation platform for Advanced LIGO gravity waves observatories. This five-ton two-and-half-meter wide system supports more than a 1000 kg of very sensitive equipment. It provides positioning capability and seismic isolation in all directions of translation and rotation. To meet the very stringent requirements of Advanced LIGO, the system must provide more than three orders of magnitude of isolation over a very large bandwidth. It must bring the motion below 10-11 m/Hz at 1 Hz and 10-12 m/Hz at 10 Hz. A prototype of this system has been built in 2006. It has been extensively tested and analyzed during the following two years. This paper shows how the experimental results obtained with the prototype were used to engineer the final design. It highlights how the engineering solutions implemented not only improved the isolation performance but also greatly simplified the assembly, testing, and commissioning process. During the past two years, five units have been constructed, tested, installed and commissioned at each of the two LIGO observatories. Five other units are being built for an upcoming third observatory. The test results presented show that the system meets the motion requirements, and reach the sensor noise in the control bandwidth

Advanced LIGO two-stage twelve-axis vibration isolation and positioning platform. Part 1: Design and production overview

New generations of gravity wave detectors require unprecedented levels of vibration isolation. This paper presents the final design of the vibration isolation and positioning platform used in Advanced LIGO to support the interferometer\u27s core optics. This five-ton two-and-half-m wide system operating in ultra-high vacuum. It features two stages of isolation mounted in series. The stages are imbricated to reduce the overall height. Each stage provides isolation in all directions of translation and rotation. The system is instrumented with a unique combination of low noise relative and inertial sensors. The active control provides isolation from 0.1 Hz to 30 Hz. It brings the platform motion down to 10-11m/√Hz at 1 Hz. Active and passive isolation combine to bring the platform motion below 10-12m/√Hz at 10 Hz. The passive isolation lowers the motion below 10-13m/√Hz at 100 Hz. The paper describes how the platform has been engineered not only to meet the isolation requirements, but also to permit the construction, testing, and commissioning process of the fifteen units needed for Advanced LIGO observatories