Methods for the measurement of air pollutants.

Abstract

Abstract Currently, air pollution is one of the most imperative problems and has a major role in global climate change and premature deaths throughout the world. Various types of air pollutants (e.g. particulate matter, NOx, SOx, CO and O3) are present in the atmosphere and have significant effects on human health, agriculture, weather and climate. Accurate measurements of air pollutants on local, regional and global levels at high spatial and temporal resolution are needed to quantify their distribution and resulting impacts. Real-time ground-level measurements of air pollutants help to understand secondary aerosol formation through atmospheric chemical transformation. On the other hand, satellite measurements of air pollutants and trace gases provide a good platform to understand the current scenario of air quality and future climate change on a global scale. Measuring air pollutants with higher accuracy is challenging because of a variety of considerations, including their chemical composition, lifetime, emission sources and complex instrumentation. A continuous improvement in air pollutant measurement techniques and instrumentation has occurred during the last two decades; however, more efforts are needed to achieve more realistic data with higher accuracy. In this chapter, an overview of various measurement techniques of air pollutants (from ground-based and satellite-based measurements) are presented.