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FRMs/FEMs and Sensors: Complementary Approaches for Determining Ambient Air Quality
Citation:
Clements, A. AND R. Vanderpool. FRMs/FEMs and Sensors: Complementary Approaches for Determining Ambient Air Quality. EPA Tools and Resources Webinar, Research Triangle Park, NC, December 18, 2019.
Impact/Purpose:
On a worldwide basis, the World Health Organization estimates that approximately 4 million people die annually from health impacts due to exposure to ambient air pollution. In the U.S., the Clean Air Act sets national limits for ambient concentrations of six “Criteria Pollutants” (CO, O3, SO2, NO2, Pb, and particulate matter) known to cause adverse health effects. The Act also requires nationwide monitoring of these pollutants using only instruments which have been formally approved by U.S. EPA as either Federal Reference Methods (FRMs) or Federal Equivalent Methods (FEMs). Although the overall pollutant measurement performance of these FRM/FEM instruments is widely recognized to produce reproduceable data of high quality, these regulatory instruments do not fulfill all possible monitoring needs. In recent years, smaller, lower cost, direct-reading air sensors have been developed to address the limitations of the FRM/FEM instruments. While these sensors do not provide regulatory type data, they fulfill the needs for more portable, lower cost instruments that support community science, spatial distribution studies, hotspot identification, public education, and personnel monitoring studies. This webinar discusses the relative advantages and disadvantages of the regulatory FRM/FEM instruments and of the sensor-based instruments used for non-regulatory monitoring. The complementary nature of these two measurement approaches will be discussed for determining ambient air quality based on specific monitoring objectives.
Description:
On a worldwide basis, the World Health Organization estimates that approximately 4 million people die annually from health impacts due to exposure to ambient air pollution. In the U.S., the Clean Air Act sets national limits for ambient concentrations of six “Criteria Pollutants” (CO, O3, SO2, NO2, Pb, and particulate matter) known to cause adverse health effects. The Act also requires nationwide monitoring of these pollutants using only instruments which have been formally approved by U.S. EPA as either Federal Reference Methods (FRMs) or Federal Equivalent Methods (FEMs). Although the overall pollutant measurement performance of these FRM/FEM instruments is widely recognized to produce reproduceable data of high quality, these regulatory instruments do not fulfill all possible monitoring needs. In recent years, smaller, lower cost, direct-reading air sensors have been developed to address the limitations of the FRM/FEM instruments. While these sensors do not provide regulatory type data, they fulfill the needs for more portable, lower cost instruments that support community science, spatial distribution studies, hotspot identification, public education, and personnel monitoring studies. This webinar will discuss the relative advantages and disadvantages of the regulatory FRM/FEM instruments and of the sensor-based instruments used for non-regulatory monitoring. The complementary nature of these two measurement approaches will be discussed for determining ambient air quality based on specific monitoring objectives. Additional information about FRM/FEM instruments and quality assurance and control procedures can be found in The Ambient Monitoring Technology Information Center (AMTIC) located at https://www.epa.gov/amtic while additional information and resources about sensors can be found in the Air Sensors Toolbox located at https://www.epa.gov/air-sensor-toolbox. Andrea Clements and Robert Vanderpool of EPA’s Office of Research and Development will present this webinar.