Multiobjective air pollution monitoring network design

Abstract

The methodologies currently available to optimize the locations of air pollutant monitoring stations typically include a single pollutant and a single objective. In this paper, multiple objective functions are introduced that provide performance measures describing the spatial coverage of the network and its ability to detect violations of standards for multiple pollutants. An additional objective regarding the effect of data validity in the design is also considered. The objective functions are cast in a manner that permits considerable flexibility in the model formulation. The numerical difficulties associated with the formulation are discussed as are extensions of the basic framework. The basic model and its extensions have been applied to the design of a monitoring network for Tarragona, Spain.