PURAT · Particles in the urban atmosphere: behaviour of fine and ultrafine particles, their spatial variation, and relationships with local policy action
FP6 — Marie Curie Actions (Human Resources and Mobility)
- Duration
- 2004-07-01 → 2005-06-30
- EU contribution
- €40,000
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- ERG
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Final Activity Report Summary - PURAT (Particles in the urban atmosphere: behaviour of fine and ultrafine particles, their spatial variation, and relationships with local policy action)
This project was concerned with exploring the spatial variability of fine (> 1 µm) and ultrafine (> 0.1 µm) particulates in urban atmospheric air. In the run-up phase of the project, quality assurance measures were developed for the field application of Particle size spectrometers (DMPS). Next, five specialised field experiments were conducted to collect urban aerosols at multiple points within the same city. The long-term experiment PURAT-0 in Leipzig established systematic differences in aerosol size distributions between an urban background and a roadside observation site. The distribution of aerosol particles in a narrow street canyon is a strong function of traffic density but also wind direction. During the experiment PURAT-1, ambient size distributions were collected at a total of eleven observation sites, revealing differences in ultrafine particle number concentration of up to two orders of magnitude within the same city. Particle number concentrations in the size range 100-400 nm correlated well between different urban background sites. However, the correlation degraded for ultrafine particles, and when correlations to roadside sites were considered. During the three-month experiment PURAT-2 in the vicinity of the Berlin urban motorway, concentrations of ultrafine particles were measured that range among the highest that have been reported in Germany. A three-dimensional emission and transport simulation confirmed the spatial patterns of aerosol dispersion around the motorway. Results from PURAT-3 and 4 in Leipzig, confirmed that the particle size distribution is far from spatially homogeneous in the microscale environment around a densely built-up street canyon. The general result is that the number of ultrafine particles tends to be far less homogeneously distributed than particle mass concentrations. The data collected will be of considerable importance for future works, such as an assessment of urban residents' exposure to ultrafine particles, the determination of vehicle emission factors as well as the validation of urban microscale dispersion models.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
The central objective of this European Reintegration project PURAT is to establish Dr Wolfram Birmil - in his home region - as a researcher with scientific independence and leadership functions. Over the next 2 years Dr Birmili intends to continue and exp and, at the Leibniz Institute for Tropospherk Research (IfT) in Leipzig, lines of research he developed between 2001 and 2003 with his EU Marie Curie host, the University of Birmingham. The research project is concerned with an experimental and theoreti cal exploration of the behaviour of fine and ultrafine atmospheric particles, such as those generated in large number by motorised traffic, in a complex urban atmosphere. The methods to exactly describe or assess the source behaviour, atmospheric behavio ur, and the health implications of these particles are currently not sufficient to warrant accurate monitoring or forecasting the exposure of entire populations to fine and ultrafine particles, left alone the development of efficient political tools to reduce the exposure risk. At his new host, Dr Birmili finds an experienced team of researchers, and also the extensive infrastructure necessary to address the properties and behaviour of fine and ultrafine particles, particularly their variation in time and space, and their physico-chemical properties and chemical composition. As a significant new training aspect, Dr Birmili will work with team members from IfT and the University of Birmingham on the validation of a numerical transport and transformati on models, based on the extensive experimental data sets collected during the early stages of this project. In a continuous dialogue with local air quality managers and officials, Dr Birmili will also scrutinize the potential implications of fine and ult rafine particle research on a local-scale environmental and health protection, as well as on future developments of EU air quality guidelines.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- LEIBNIZ INSTITUT FUER TROPOSPHAERENFORSCHUNG E.V. · LEIPZIGCoordinatorGermany
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union