High spatiotemporal characterization of on-road PM2.5 concentrations in high-density urban areas using mobile monitoring

Abstract

Mobile air quality monitoring reports air pollutant concentrations at a high spatiotemporal resolution, enabling the characterization of heterogeneous human exposure and localized pollution hotspots. In this study, on-road concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in a high-density urban area in Hong Kong were measured in December 2014 and January 2015 (winter) and June and July 2015 (summer) using a tramcar mobile monitoring platform. We developed a method of mapping the winter and summer on-road PM2.5 concentrations along a tramcar route at a 50-m spatial resolution, using mobile measurements. In addition, the minimum number of days required to precisely estimate on-road PM2.5 concentrations was estimated. The results showed that the on-road PM2.5 concentrations were highly correlated with PM2.5 concentrations measured at a nearby roadside air quality monitoring station (AQMS) in both winter and summer, with Pearson correlation coefficients of 0.89–0.93. The resulting maps of winter and summer on-road PM2.5 concentrations revealed small-scale spatial patterns used to identify more polluted areas. In addition, approximately 12 and 4 days were required to precisely capture spatial patterns of PM2.5 concentrations, with R2 higher than 0.6 in winter and in summer. The findings of this study offer valuable information on air pollution control and exposure reduction by highlighting localized pollution hotspots, and provide insights into the minimum sampling duration for mobile sampling campaigns.