Advances in Science and Research www.adv-sci-res.net 1992-0628 1992-0636 2 7th EMS Annual Meeting and 8th European Conference on Applications of Meteorology 2007 2008 10.5194/asr-2-21-2008 http://www.adv-sci-res.net/2/21/2008/ http://www.adv-sci-res.net/2/21/2008/asr-2-21-2008.html http://www.adv-sci-res.net/2/21/2008/asr-2-21-2008.pdf 21 26 2008-04-09 Forecasting the air pollution episode potential in the Canary Islands C. Milford cmilford@inm.es C. Marrero C. Martin J. J. Bustos X. Querol Institute of Earth Sciences "Jaume Almera", CSIC, Barcelona, Spain Izaña Atmospheric Research Center, Agencia Estatal de Meteorología, Tenerife, Spain In the frame of the WMO Global Atmosphere Watch Urban Research Meteorology and Environment programme (GURME), a system for forecasting air pollution episode potential in the Canary Islands has been developed. Meteorological parameters relevant to air quality (synoptic wind speed, wind direction, boundary layer height and temperature at 91 vertical levels) are obtained from the European Centre for Medium range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) once a day for up to four days ahead. In addition, a model based on the analogue method utilising six years of historical meteorological and air quality data predicts the probability of SO₂ concentration exceeding certain thresholds for a measurement station located in Santa Cruz de Tenerife. Meteorological forecasts are also provided from a high resolution (2 km) local area model (MM5) implemented for the Canary Islands domain. This simple system is able to forecast meteorological conditions which are favourable to the occurrence of pollution episodes for the forthcoming days. Alonso-Pérez, S., Pey, J., Cuevas, E., Querol, X., Alastuey, A., Romero, P. M., and Cristobal, A.: Sistema de información sobre intrusiones de masas de aire africano en España, in: Proceedings of the IX Congreso de Ingeniería Ambiental PROMA 2004, Bilbao, Spain, 10–12 November 2004, 621–629, 2004. Brunekreef, B. and Holgate, S. T.: Air pollution and health, Lancet, 360, 1233–1242, 2002. Grell, G. A., Dudhia, J., and Stauffer, D. R.: A description of the fifth-generation Penn State/NCAR mesoscale model (MM5), NCAR Technical Note, NCAR/TN-398+STR, 117 pp., 1994. Grell, G. A., Peckham, S. E., Schmitz, R., McKeen, S. A., Frost, G., Skamarock, W. C., and Eder, B.: Fully coupled "online" chemistry within the WRF model, Atmos. Environ., 39, 6957–6975, 2005. Hooyberghs, J., Mensink, C., Dumont, G., Fierens, F., and Brasseur, O.: A neural network forecast for daily average PM10 concentrations in Belgium, Atmos. Environ., 39, 3279–3289, 2005. Instituto Canario de Estadística (ISTAC): Anuario Estadístico de Canarias: 2006, Gobierno de Canarias, 2007. Kukkonen, J., Pohjola, M., Sokhi, R. S., Luhana, L., Kitwiroon, N., Fragkou, L., Rantamäki, M., Berge, E., Odegaard, V., Slordal, L. H., Denby, B., and Finardi, S.: Analysis and evaluation of selected local-scale PM10 air pollution episodes in four European cities: Helsinki, London, Milan and Oslo, Atmos. Environ., 39, 2759–2773, 2005. Marrero, C. and Bustos, J. J.: Adaptación para Canarias de un modelo de predicción estadística de la precipitación mediante un método analógico, in: Proceedings of the Primer Encuentro sobre Meteorología y Atmósfera de Canarias, Tenerife, Spain, 12–14 November 2003, 107–109, 2003. Nunnari, G., Dorling, S., Schlink, U., Cawley, G., Foxall, R., and Chatterton, T.: Modelling SO₂ concentration at a point with statistical approaches, Environ. Modell. Softw., 19, 887–905, 2004. Obled, C., Bontron, G., and Garcon, R.: Quantitative precipitation forecasts: a statistical adaptation of model outputs through an analogues sorting approach, Atmos. Res., 63, 303–324, 2002. Otte, T. L., Pouliot, G., Pleim, J. E., Young, J. O., Schere, K. L., and Mathur, R.: Linking the Eta Model with the Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) modeling system to build a national air quality forecasting system, Weather Forecast., 20, 367–384, 2005 Samet, J. and Krewski, D.: Health effects associated with exposure to ambient air pollution, J. Toxicol. Env. Heal. A, 70, 227–242, 2007. Wetterhall, F., Halldin, S., and Xu, C. Y.: Statistical precipitation downscaling in central Sweden with the analogue method, J. Hydrol., 306, 174–190, 2005. Zorita, E. and von Storch, H.: The analog method as a simple statistical downscaling technique: Comparison with more complicated methods, methods, J. Climate, 12, 2474–2489, 1999.