Operational short term health impact assessment of air pollution modelling system over Europe

The last decade, scientific studies have indicated an association between air pollution to which people are exposed and wide range of adverse health outcomes. We have developed a tool which is based on a model (MM5-CMAQ) running over Europe with 50 km spatial resolution, based on EMEP annual emissions, to produce a short-term forecast of the impact on health. In order to estimate the mortality change (forecasted for the next 24 hours) we have chosen a log-linear (Poisson) regression form to estimate the concentration-response function. The parameters involved in the C-R function have been estimated based on epidemiological studies, which have been published. Finally, we have derived the relationship between concentration change and mortality change from the C-R function which is the final health impact function

Effects of traffic emission reduction on urban air quality episode using WRF/Chem

Traffic emission control strategies have been tested in order to reduce the effects of traffic on pollution concentrations in Madrid (Spain) during an air quality episode with very large NOx concentrations. The meteorology-chemistry model WRF/Chem allows forecasting these effects with high spatial resolution (1 km). It was necessary to develop very detailed emission inventories with a bottom-up methodology. For traffic emissions, the traffic flow simulation model SUMO has been applied, using the real time traffic counters data, Madrid vehicle fleet distribution, and emission factors from EMEP-CORINAIR Tier 3 methodology. The base or control simulation has been compared with data from the Madrid air quality monitoring network. The control simulation reproduces satisfactorily the high NO2 concentration values. The traffic reduction strategies which were taken on 28 and 29 December 2016, did not contribute substantially to improve the air quality in Madrid

Analysis of health impact assessment to outdoor and indoor air pollution in a prototype building in Madrid (Spain)

People spend major part of their time inside places such as homes and offices, so it is very important to know the indoor and outdoor pollution in this type of studies. The atmospheric dispersion model WRF/Chem is used to know the outdoor pollution and meteorological conditions with high spatial (1 km) and temporal (1-hour) resolution and the building energy model EnergyPlus to simulate the indoor contaminants. EnergyPlus model is used to investigate the dynamic behaviour of pollutants with a single package using a multizone approach. 2016 year is used for the simulations with hourly outputs. Outdoor and indoor pollutions are linked to through the simulated infiltration process. The evaluation of outdoor, indoor air quality and human health effects was carried out considering different exposure profiles, for people working and living in an office and house located in the same building in the Madrid city center. The study takes into account different ventilation modes in the building and indoor emission scenarios (oven for heating, cooking, photocopy machine, smoke cigarettes). Health impact assessment considered mortality and hospital admissions, associated with exposure to PM2.5 and NO2 taking into account the differences between the exposure profiles, which have been used to describe the time activity patterns of the people. The health impacts of emitting sources are highest in the warm months due to the operation of the air conditioning system. The health impact of indoor emission sources is higher than the outdoor pollution. People in the zone where the emitting sources are located would experience a mortality and morbidity of 2.5 times more than in the non-emitting zones

Effects of climate change on the health of citizens modelling urban weather and air pollution

A dynamical downscaling tool has been implemented to understand the impacts of global climate on citizens health. We have used the WRF-Chem mesoscale model (NOAA, USA) to produce information covering Europe with 25 km of spatial resolution and two nested domains with 5 km and 1 km of spatial resolution over London. Finally, detailed simulations are carried out using the MICROSYS-CFD model to take into account the effects of urban buildings on the urban atmosphere in the Kensington and Chelsea area. The tool produces very high spatial air quality and meteorological data (50 m) and also temporal resolution (1 h) to estimate health impacts in the short term, using exposure-response functions extracted from epidemiological studies. The comparison shows an acceptable agreement of the modelled data with the measurements. The effects on the health of citizens by temperature change in the future are more important than by changes in atmospheric pollutant concentrations. The maps show how the effects depend on the city's geometry and how the tool can highlight the most vulnerable areas to help to design plans and implement strategic measures to mitigate the effects of global climate change on people's health. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Impact of Sahara dust aerosols on regional climate over the Iberian Peninsula with RegCM4

The objective of our study is to investigate the impact of dust aerosols and future changes on regional climate over the Iberian Peninsula, where dust events frequently occur because Sahara desert is very close. The climatic effects of dust aerosols are investigated using the last version of the Regional Climate Model system RegCM4 with a spatial resolution of 20 Km and 18 sigma vertical levels. In relation to the first simulation, initial and lateral boundary conditions are created using reanalysis data. In the second experiment, there is two simulations for the 2050 year with boundary conditions from the CCM3 global model, one containing concentration of dust aerosols and the other omitting dust. The effects of Sahara dust events on ground temperatures and precipitations are presented in this work. The results indicated that dust aerosols generally produced negative radiative forcing at the top of the atmosphere over most areas

Global climate driven effects on urban air pollution simulations using very high spatial resolution

A dynamic downscaling tool has been implemented that uses global climate data with 1° spatial resolution to provide information of pollutant concentrations with a resolution of 50 metres, taking into account 3D obstacles. The tool has been used to understand the climate impact on air quality in the cities of Milan and London. Future years (2030, 2050 and 2100) have been compared to the present year (2011) for RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 scenarios. The system has been previously evaluated by comparing its results driven by real global meteorological data with the data measured by air quality monitoring stations. The performance of the system has been considered acceptable. The spatial distributions of the differences between the future and present averages emphasise how climate change could affect areas of the cities differently. The forecast changes obtained show the relevance of this type of work with high spatial resolution

Health effects of indoor emissions combining outdoor and indoor pollution simulations

The aim of the paper is to show that it is very important to take into account indoor pollution when studying the health effects of the quality of the air we are breathing. The simulations must consider the indoor emissions because they are the ones that make the concentrations of the air that we breathe are different from the outdoor concentrations. We have performed a simulation exercise of air quality both outdoor and indoor in 2 buildings (office and home) located in the center of Madrid (Spain), with different scenarios of indoor emissions to isolate their impacts. The simulations are run over full year 2016 with hourly outputs. The simulations must also model atmospheric dynamics to produce meteorological data that will be key to indoor simulations. Exposure to pollutant concentrations has been calculated based on a predefined pattern that indicates where the person is at each time. In indoor pollution simulations it is very important to model all the physical processes that affect concentrations, such as: emission, infiltration, deposition, mechanical and manual ventilation (closely related to the thermal comfort range of the building) and air exchange between rooms through the doors. The highest impact on health is produced by the emissions that are released when people are cooking

Bericht der Expertenkommission zur Untersuchung der Auswirkungen des Hochschulrahmengesetzes (HRG)

UuStB Koeln(38)-8406364 / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman