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Effects of roadway configurations on near-road air quality and the implications on roadway designs
Citation:
Steffens, J., D. Heist, S. Perry, V. Isakov, R. Baldauf, AND K. Zhang. Effects of roadway configurations on near-road air quality and the implications on roadway designs. ATMOSPHERIC ENVIRONMENT. Elsevier Science Ltd, New York, NY, 94:74-85, (2014).
Impact/Purpose:
The National Exposure Research Laboratory’s Atmospheric Modeling Division (AMAD) conducts research in support of EPA’s mission to protect human health and the environment. AMAD’s research program is engaged in developing and evaluating predictive atmospheric models on all spatial and temporal scales for forecasting the Nation’s air quality and for assessing changes in air quality and air pollutant exposures, as affected by changes in ecosystem management and regulatory decisions. AMAD is responsible for providing a sound scientific and technical basis for regulatory policies based on air quality models to improve ambient air quality. The models developed by AMAD are being used by EPA, NOAA, and the air pollution community in understanding and forecasting not only the magnitude of the air pollution problem, but also in developing emission control policies and regulations for air quality improvements.
Description:
This paper presents an analysis of wind tunnel experiments of twelve different roadway configurations and modeling of these configurations using a Large-Eddy Simulation (LES) model, aiming at investigating how flow structures affect the impact of roadway features on near-road and on-road air quality. The presence of roadside barriers, elevated fill and depressed roadways, and combinations of these configurations all reduce ground-level air pollutant concentrations immediately downwind of roadways. However, all of these cases, except the elevated fill configuration, increase pollutant concentrations on the roadway itself. For a roadside barrier with finite length, higher concentrations than those without a barrier are present in a small region near the edge of the barrier, influenced by complex flow in that region which we term “Edge Effects”. The inclusion of multiple roadway features often result in lower downwind pollutant concentrations than those with single roadway features; however, adding features typically offers diminishing returns in concentration reduction. Generally, the effects on concentration, both beneficial and adverse will damp out within 15 multiples of the characteristic height, be it the barrier height or the elevation/depression height of the roadway. Thus, evaluating the trade-off between the air pollutant reductions near the ground and the air pollutant increases on the roadway and elevated above the ground will be important in designing a sustainable transportation system.
