Surface ozone monitoring and policy: A geospatial decision support tool for suitable location of monitoring stations in urban areas

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Fixed site monitoring is the primary method of measuring surface ozone pollution for health advisories and pollutant reduction, but the spatial scale may not reflect the current population distribution or its future growth. Moreover, formal methods for the placement of ozone monitoring sites within populations regions omit important spatial criteria producing monitoring locations that could unintentionally bias the exposure burden. Because ozone pollution endangers human health, triggering shortness of breath, causing asthma attacks and mortality, a need exists for assessing the spatial representativeness and data gaps of existing pollution monitors and to evaluate future placement strategies of additional monitors. A new metric, the potency index, for assessing the placements of monitors in relation to population distribution was developed. This index was used to evaluate the configuration of the ozone pollution monitoring network in relation to the population distribution in Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW). Location-allocation models were used to optimize future sensor quantity and placement. Finally, we propose the development of a decision support system that uses evaluation and optimization methods to improve air pollution monitoring objectives.