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Next Generation Emission Measurements for Fugitive, Area Source, and Fence Line Applications?
Citation:
Thoma, E., H. Brantley, J. Dewees, R. Merrill, AND D. Nash. Next Generation Emission Measurements for Fugitive, Area Source, and Fence Line Applications? Presented at U.S. EPA Region 4 Air Monitoring Workshop, Athens, GA, April 12 - 14, 2016.
Impact/Purpose:
Remote webinar presentation for EPA Region 4 Air Monitoring Workshop on Thursday 4/14/16. Please note that this was a short notice request by Region 4 to present on this topic. Sorry for the lack of review time but please note that the material contained here was previously cleared as part of other presentations.
Description:
Next generation emissions measurements (NGEM) is an EPA term for the rapidly advancing field of air pollutant sensor technologies, data integration concepts, and associated geospatial modeling strategies for source emissions measurements. Ranging from low coat sensors to satellite remote sensing, future NGEM systems promise revolutionary new capability for air quality science. NGEM tools may be particularly useful in understanding emissions from fugitive and area sources of air pollution and greenhouses gases. Whereas the knowledge base for emissions from point sources (stacks) and mobiles sources (tailpipes) is relatively mature, non-point sources such as landfills, waste water treatment facilities, agricultural operations, and fugitive emissions from industrial facilities and energy production are not as well characterized. The reason for this is these sources are more complex with emissions that are distributed over large areas with uncertain emission locations. Emissions can be temporally variable and profoundly affected by environmental factors and operational conditions. The stochastic and site-specific nature of these sources make them difficult to both measure and model. NGEM concepts such as mobile measurements and passive and active fence line monitoring are providing new ways to both study and mitigate non-point emissions. This talk provides a brief overview of the application of some NGEM concepts as a way to improve fugitive and area source emissions information.