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Integration of gas chromatographs into the Federal Highway Administration/Environmental Protection Agency near road MSAT study in Las Vegas, NV
Citation:
SHORES, R. C., A. F. VETTE, E. S. KIMBROUGH, D. A. WHITAKER, V. MARTINEZ, K. N. Black, R. W. BALDAUF, AND D. A. VALLERO. Integration of gas chromatographs into the Federal Highway Administration/Environmental Protection Agency near road MSAT study in Las Vegas, NV. In Proceedings, A&WMA Annual Conference & Exhibition, Detroit, MI, June 16 - 19, 2009. AWMA, Pittsburgh, PA, (2009).
Impact/Purpose:
AWMA conference paper
Description:
This paper documents the technical evaluation of a semi-continuous gas chromatograph (GC) for the measurement of benzene and 1,33butadiene in the near road environment. This paper will also consider the some of the non-technical implications associated with the operation of a GC outside the laboratory. GC operation in ambient air monitoring networks has been used for many years but most of these applications utilized relatively expensive GCs and required an excessive amount of knowledge and time to maintain data collection4,5,6. This evaluation will compare the performance of the GC to the criteria specified in the compendium protocol procedures. The decision to incorporate GC operation within the study was to be considered only after the operation of a single GC was evaluated. The near road measurement activities began with only one GC operating at the 10 meter site. The results of this evaluation will determine if the GC's performance is acceptable and also provide input into the decision to purchase additional GCs, resulting in near real time MSAT data at all four sites. Near real time MSAT data is desirable and the cost of four GCs has been estimated to be less than the project costs associated with one year of canister sampling and analysis.
