Application of degree-day factors for residential emission estimate and air quality forecasting

Abstract

Results of air quality modelling are strongly influenced by the emission inventory used. This is related to spatial and temporal allocation of emission. In Poland, the share of residential combustion (RC) in total emission of particulate matter is large, and the temporal profile of emission from this sector is influenced by meteorological conditions. Here we show the performance of the WRF-Chem model forecasts, running for the area of Poland with two different approaches to temporal distribution of emission from RC. First, emissions are distributed temporally using the monthly, daily and hourly emission factors provided by GENEMIS project (base run). Second, the model uses the heating degree-day (HDD) approach RC. We show that both approaches result in similar model performance for PM10 and PM2.5. The HDD approach leads to better forecasts for the warm days, whereas the base run forecasts often show too high concentrations of atmospheric pollutants for such periods.