A GIS model for urban air quality analysis

PULIAFITO, ENRIQUE; GANTUZ, MIGUEL; PULIAFITO, CARLOS MARIO

Bariloche, Argentina

Congreso; XIV Congreso sobre métodos numéricos y sus aplicaciones, ENIEF 20004; 2004

Asociación Argentina de Mecánica Computacional

Abstract: Like many big urban centers, Mendoza, a city of about 900,000 inhabitants, has increasing air pollution mostly from mobile sources. To asses on its air quality, two main strategies has been developed: the setup of a network of monitoring stations and the development of a comprehensive model. Continuous monitoring and daily measurements of main pollutants had been performed since more than 10 years, at different sites, combined with several measuring campaigns. On the other side, a model, based on a geographical information system has been developed to evaluate the air quality derived from stationary and mobile sources. once the model has been calibrated with the given measurements, the system is then used to test the compliance to local standard air quality, or to study the environmental impact of new industries or to determine the changing conditions when vehicle circulation is increased. This allows characterizing areas with potential increase in air pollution or improvement in air quality. It is also possible to compute different scenarios by changing basic information as traffic flow, or stack emission rates. Keywords: urban air quality, geographical information system, atmospheric dispersion