Citation:

Isakov, V., T. Barzyk, S. Arunachalam, M. Snyder, AND A. Venkatram. A Community-Scale Modeling System to Assess Port-Related Air Quality Impacts. Chapter 63, Air Pollution Modeling and its Application XXIV. Springer International Publishing AG, Cham (ZG), Switzerland, , 385-390, (2016).

Impact/Purpose:

The National Exposure Research Laboratory (NERL) Atmospheric Modeling and Analysis Division (AMAD) conducts research in support of EPA mission to protect human health and the environment. AMAD research program is engaged in developing and evaluating predictive atmospheric models on all spatial and temporal scales for forecasting the 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:

Near-port air pollution has been identified by numerous organizations as a potential public health concern. Based upon multiple near-road and near-source monitoring studies, both busy roadways and large emission sources at the ports may impact local air quality within several hundred meters of the ports. As the volume of trucking and freight movement increases, near-road air quality along transportation routes could be affected well outside port boundaries. Health effects have been associated with near-road exposures and proximity to large emission sources, so characterizing emission sources is important for understanding potential health effects. To address this need, we have developed a new community-scale tool called C-PORT to model emissions related to all port-related activities—including, but not limited to ships, trucks, cranes, etc.—and predict concentrations at fine spatial scales in the near-source environment. C-PORT represents one of the first efforts to develop a reduce-form modeling system that is optimized for community-scale applications. The modeling system includes dispersion algorithms for area, point, and line sources related to port activities, and emissions from the port terminals. The use of the reduced-form approach in C-PORT enables us to examine what-if scenarios of changes in emission volume, such as due to changes in traffic counts, fleet mix, speed, or in port emissions due to equipment or vehicles in near real-time, using a web-based easy-to-use interface. The C-PORT model can be used to examine different scenarios of air quality impacts in order to identify potentially at-risk populations located near emission sources, and the effects that port expansion may have on them. We present an illustrative example of the near-port modeling assessment focusing on the Port of Charleston in South Carolina, USA, to complement a field-study that was conducted during spring 2014 to take air quality measurements in residential neighborhoods in the port vicinity.

URLs/Downloads:

Record Details: