Monitoring Air Quality Variations in Complex Terrain using a Multi-Platform Approach Alexander A. Jacques, Erik T. Crosman, and John D. Horel Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of

Motivation and Objectives Real-Time Web Displays Dec 2017 Persistent Cold Air Pool Event

• Observations of criteria pollutants in urban environments often limited in • Observations from all sensors are collected and processed in real-time with minimal latency • Chopper 5 sensor package upgraded late 2017 to include ambient air temperature data space (few fixed site platforms) and time (hourly averaging) • Data made available for public use and consumption via several web-based products • Thermocouple probe attached to front of helicopter for maximum exposure • Urban regions in complex terrain subject to several types of meteorological • Real-time Displays and Mobile Archive: http://utahaq.chpc.utah.edu/ • Thermal profiles produced to compare against PM2.5 measurements phenomena that can impact criteria pollutant distributions • Fixed-site Data API Services: https://developers.synopticdata.com/ • 8-16 Dec 2017: Strong upper-level ridging resulted in a strengthening low-level inversion • Terrain-driven thermal flows, persistent stable layers, etc. • Additional UTA TRAX and Fixed-Site Data Viewers courtesy U-ATAQ: https://air.utah.edu/ • 12-15 Dec 2017: Fog and low stratus became persistent across the SL Valley • Scales as small as a few km (spatial) and a few minutes (temporal) • 13 Dec 2017: Chopper 5 transects along east side of SL Valley showed an interesting two-

• Salt Lake (SL) Valley impacted by complex terrain flows as well as winds layer structure of higher PM2.5 concentrations near the surface and aloft O Data: 21 Jun 2017 1730 Local (2330 UTC) generated by thermal differences with the Great Salt Lake • Spatial gradients at short time scales 3 • Over previous 3 years, additional fixed-site and mobile research-grade are discoverable in Chopper 5 sensors have been deployed across the SL Valley observations when flying horizontally NW surface flow off • Quantify short-term spatial and temporal gradients in PM2.5 and O3 • Several instances where lake breezes Great Salt Lake • Relate concentration gradients to meteorological phenomena appear to impact the distribution of

both O3 (figure to right) and PM2.5 across the greater SL Valley Fixed Site and Mobile Platforms • Chopper 5 also provides a sense of background conditions when flying outside of immediate urban areas • MesoWest research group deployed fixed-site PM2.5 and O3 sensors at three additional locations within the SL Valley ( ) • Real-time data access to official air quality observations from Utah DAQ ( ) and other research-grade instrumentation courtesy of Meteorological Solutions, Inc. and U/Utah U-ATAQ group ( ) • Routine Mobile Research Platforms Flight outside of urban area • UTA TRAX (Mitchell et al. 2018) • KSL-TV Chopper 5 News Helicopter (Crosman et al. 2017)

Summer 2017 Brian Head Fire

• 17 Jun 2017 – 24 Jul 2017: 71,673 acres burned (NICC 2017 Annual Report) • Chopper 5 made several transects around the fire as part of extensive media coverage • Transects intersected with primary smoke plume on several occasions • Data collection and research related to the fire featured in KSL News Article

PM2.5 Data: 23 Jun 2017 1330-1420 Local (1930-2020 UTC)

Transects through active fire region

Image Source: ksl.com Panguitch Lake Future Work

Transect through • Mobile deployments on UTA TRAX and Chopper 5 continue to transmit data when active Brian Head UTA TRAX Red Line smoke plume • Fixed-site data continue to be collected and made available via real-time web resources UTA TRAX Green Line east of active fire • Potential for expansion of new and existing data dissemination capabilities UTA TRAX Blue Line KSL-TV Chopper 5 Base • Possible inclusion of additional lower-cost sensors on fixed-site and mobile platforms • Continued research of spatial variation impacts due to mesoscale flows, wildfires, etc.

Acknowledgements

• 23 Jun 2017 - Chopper 5 Brian Head Fire Transects • KSL-TV Chopper 5: KSL Broadcasting and helicopter pilot Ben Tidswell • Southwesterly flow had drastically expanded the fire to east of its origin point • UTA TRAX: U/Utah LAIR Group and • Chopper 5 flew several times through the smoke plume near the active burning area • Fixed-site Sensors: Neil Armstrong Academy, Lindsey Nesbitt, and The Waterford School • Additional transect through the smoke plume to the east of the active fire • Data Storage and Display: U/Utah CHPC and Synoptic Data AWS Cloud Resources