University of Houston receives $2 million to develop air quality forecasting modelHouston 23 Oct 2000 The Environmental Protection Agency budget, which was passed by the U.S. Congress recently, includes $2 million for the University of Houston (UH) to research and develop an ozone simulation and forecasting model of the Houston and Gulf Coast region.
Using supercomputers and sophisticated mathematical modelling techniques, the UH
researchers, led by Tony Haymet, UH professor of chemistry, will look at the
complex issues of ozone production and transport, and will examine over 150
other air-borne chemicals in the categories of volatile organics, the oxides of
nitrogen (NOx) and particulates to determine their production and transportation
for this particular region and weather systems over extended periods of time.
The research team is coming together through the UH Texas Learning and
Computation Center. Dr. Haymet will be working with top mathematicians,
including UH professor Roland Glowinski, who holds the French National Medal of
Science; chemical engineers, including UH professors and National Academy of
Engineering members Neal Amundson and Dan Luss; UH Clear Lake professor Jim
Lester, head of the UH/UHCL Environmental Studies Institute; and other U.S.
institutions.
"All the current models used for ozone simulation are based on the models
developed for Los Angeles in the 1970s", stated Arthur Vailas, UH Vice President
for Research and Intellectual Property Management. "This new initiative will
bring experts from all of these fields to develop the appropriate model that
specifically characterises the Gulf Coast area, including the emissions from our
factories and automobiles, changes in weather patterns, humidity, and our
natural resources, such as swamps and bayous. This programme will model ozone and
air quality transport and how it changes over a given day, month, year."
Dr. Vailas explained that Houston currently is one of the most studied cities in the
country with more environmental sensors per square mile than any other city. The
Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission (TNRCC) and federal agencies have
funded a major inter-institutional study to collect data over time from these
sensors.
"With the help of collaborators at organisations like the Greater Houston
Partnership, and other Universities state and worldwide, our efforts will add
new mathematical algorithms and computer codes to predict the formation of both
ozone and fine particulate aerosols which will be the focus of future regulatory
action, and of great concern to Houston", stated Dr. Haymet. "Coupled with specific
data about Houston weather and the chemical reactions occurring in the air,
ozone concentrations for specific episodes in 1993, 1998, 1999 and 2000 will be
calculated for both the actual conditions existing at the time, and for a
variety of reduced emissions, which TNRCC and others suggest Houston should
achieve by 2003 and beyond", Dr. Haymet added.
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