Nonlinear Adaptive Filtering to ForecastAir Pollution

Abstract

Air pollution is an important problem concerning the quality of living and health conditions of the population in urban areas (Pasero & Mesin, 2010). Indeed, the issue of air quality is now a major concern for many governments worldwide. Since the early 1970s, the EU has been working to improve air quality by controlling emissions of harmful substances into the atmosphere, by improving fuel quality and by integrating environmental protection requirements into the transport and energy sectors. As the result of EU legislation, much progress has been made in tackling air pollutants. However air quality continues to cause problems. As an example, photochemical smog, particularly active in sunny days, regularly exceeds a safe limit over main European metropolitan areas. EU legislation established an hourly average of 180μg/m3 as the threshold of safe limit for ozone (Directive 2002/3/EC) beyond which authorities have to inform population. According to the indications of the Environment Commissioner Janez Potocnik (Potocnik, 2010), air pollution is responsible for 370.000 premature deaths in EU each year. Airborne particles (e.g. Particulate Matter with diameter lower or equal to 10 m, PM10) are mainly present in pollutant emissions from industry, traffic and domestic heating. They can cause asthma, cardiovascular problems, lung cancer and premature death. The EU Directive 2008/50/EC requires Member States to ensure that certain limit values for PM10 are met. These limits, which were to be met by 2005, impose both an annual average concentration value (40 ┤g/m3), and a daily concentration value (50 ┤g/m3) which must not be exceeded more than 35 times per calendar year (European Environmental Bureau, 2005). The World Health Organization pointed out that USA traffic fatalities are over 40.000 per year, while air pollution claims 70.000 lives annually (Air Quality Guidelines, WHO, 2006). Experimental studies carried on Oslo urban site pointed out the temporal connection between cardiopulmonary inflammatory state of sick citizens and high concentration of PM in the area, especially in winter and early spring time (Schwarze P.E. et al, 2010). The impact of air pollution is on human health and on ecosystems also, as marine, freshwater, grassland, heat or forest ecosystem. The air pollution is directly linked to acidification of forests and water ecosystems, and eutrophication of soils and waters, leading to limited supply of oxygen in rivers and lakes. The benefits of air pollution abatement in the heat and grassland ecosystem, typical European farm environment, have been estimated as two hundred millions of euro each year saved (DeSmet et al, 2007). Indeed, air pollution not only affects