Air Pollution in an Urban Area of Mexico: Sources of Emission (Vehicular, Natural, Industrial, and Brick Production)

In recent years, the interest in aerosol particles has increased due to concerns about the effects on human health. The study of the chemical characterization (organic matter, sulfates, nitrates, and black carbon) has improved the knowledge about the negative contribution of chemicals to the environment. The identification of secondary processes (from pollutants such as SO2, NOx, and PAHs) and their role when combined with environmental factors such as humidity, solar radiation, and temperature are also of interest. With this background, this chapter seeks to highlight the most recent findings on the chemical composition of aerosol particles in the ambient air of one of the main cities of Mexico: the Metropolitan Area of Guadalajara. This megalopolis has almost 60% of the population of the Jalisco state, approximately 2.2 million vehicles and an extensive artisan brick production. Furthermore, due to its geographical position, it experiences frequent episodes of thermal inversion and exposition to high levels of solar radiation, mainly during the first half of the year

Time delay evaluation on thewater-leaving irradiance retrieved from empirical models and satellite imagery

Temporal delays and spatial randomness between ground-based data and satellite overpass involve important deviations between the empirical model output and real data; these are factors poorly considered in the model calibration. The inorganic matter-generated turbidity in Lake Chapala (Mexico) was taken as a study case to expose the influence of such factors. Ground-based data from this study and historical records were used as references. We take advantage of the at-surface reflectance from Landsat-8, sun-glint corrections, a reduced NIR-band range, and null organic matter incidence in these wavelengths to diminish the physical phenomena-related radiometric artifacts; leaving the spatio-temporal relationships as the principal factor inducing the model uncertainty. Non-linear correlations were assessed to calibrate the best empirical model; none of them presented a strong relationship (<73%), including that based on hourly delays. This last model had the best predictability only for the summer-fall season, explaining 71% of the turbidity variation in 2016, and 59% in 2017, with RMSEs < 24%. The instantaneous turbidity maps depicted the hydrodynamic complexity of the lake, highlighting a strong component of spatial randomness associated with the temporal delays. Reasonably, robust empirical models will be developed if several dates and sampling-sites are synchronized with more satellite overpasses.</p

Ciencias Ambientales

En este estudio, se empleó un consorcio microbiano proveniente del fluido ruminal vacuno para evaluar y modelar la cinética de depuración anaerobia de vinazas de la industria alcoholera, mediante la degradación de su materia orgánica expresada como DQO y la generación de biogás. Los resultados mostraron una alta capacidad depurativa del sustrato, disminuyendo en más de la mitad el contenido orgánico inicial; además, para mejorar la eficiencia del proceso, se modificaron las condiciones de operación como: la temperatura, agitación, pH y las características del vertido; encontrando su valores óptimos para cada variable

Evaluación y modelado de la cinética de depuración anaerobia de vinazas de la industria alcoholera

En este estudio, se empleó un consorcio microbiano proveniente del fluido ruminal vacuno para evaluar y modelar la cinética de depuración anaerobia de vinazas de la industria alcoholera, mediante la degradación de su materia orgánica expresada como DQO y la generación de biogás. Los resultados mostraron una alta capacidad depurativa del sustrato, disminuyendo en más de la mitad el contenido orgánico inicial; además, para mejorar la eficiencia del proceso, se modificaron las condiciones de operación como: la temperatura, agitación, pH y las características del vertido; encontrando su valores óptimos para cada variable

Air Pollution - Monitoring, Quantification and Removal of Gases and Particles

Currently, one of the most evident and dangerous contaminants aspects for the health of all living beings is air pollution. To understand the severity of this environmental problem, in this book the authors make an in-depth review of different environmental aspects on monitoring, quantification and elimination of emissions to the atmosphere, generated by diverse anthropogenic activities in large cities. Contributors of this book have made an effort to put their ideas in simple terms without forgoing quality. The principal objective of this book is to present the most recent technical literature to all interested readers in this field