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PROJECT OVERVIEW
In October 2001, NASA began a three-year federally
funded grant project to develop and validate an improved urban air quality
modeling system using high-resolution remote sensing data. Cool
Communities, GRTA (Georgia Regional Transportation Authority), and Georgia
Environmental Protection Division are partners in support of NASA�s
research effort. The Atlanta Regional Commission and the U.S. EPA Region
IV are serving in an advisory and consulting role for the project. The
research will be based on the metro Atlanta region as a follow-up to a
previous NASA study (Project ATLANTA) on Atlanta�s Urban Heat Island.
The NASA project represents a significant change in
approach to modeling air quality in that it aims to create an integrated
land cover and emission control model to improve air quality in the
Atlanta region.
OBJECTIVE
The objective of the new project was to develop an
air quality modeling system that will allow stakeholders the opportunity
to quantify the impact of land cover and land use changes on air quality,
particularly on ground level ozone. Cool Communities� heat island
mitigation strategies, such as increased tree canopy and lighter
reflective materials for roofing and paving, were tested and evaluated
for their potential to be implemented through policy changes and/or
voluntary incentives. Considerations were reviewed in terms of
feasibility, practicality, economics, scope and implementation incentives.
Reduction in urban
temperatures through land cover changes offers a new and promising method
of ozone mitigation as an additional component to traditional strategies
involving emission control. Research has shown that heat island
mitigation strategies can reduce summer temperatures: however, quantifying the
impact of temperature reduction on air quality has proven to be a much more difficult task given the
limitations of current air quality models. Initial results indicate that
more refined modeling programs will be needed, combining complex
meteorological data with improved land cover data in order to validate and
quantify air quality benefits from heat island mitigation strategies.
Recognizing
the difficulty in developing models to capture the air quality
benefits of heat island mitigation strategies, the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency has recently developed a policy to incorporate �emerging
measures,� such as urban heat island mitigation, into a State
Implementation Plan (SIP) for air quality attainment or maintenance by
providing some flexibility in meeting established SIP requirements for
enforceability and quantification. With this new policy, �the EPA
supports and encourages the testing of merging new pollutant reduction
strategies.�
PROJECT PARTICIPANTS
� Researchers:
NASA Global Hydrology and Climate Center, Marshall Space Flight
Center, Huntsville, AL
� Partners:
Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, Georgia Environmental
Protection Division, Georgia Cool Communities, DigitalGlobe (satellite
imaging)
� Consultants/Advisors:
U.S. EPA Region IV, Atlanta Regional Commission, Georgia Tech, Georgia Dept. of Transportation, Georgia Power.
For additional information, link to
NASA
web site or Georgia Trend Magazine, November 2002
Issue,
"Thinking Clean and Green"
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