The statistical characters of PM 10 in Belgrade area

Abstract

The concentrations of air pollutants depend on meteorological conditions and pollutant emission level. From the statistical properties of air pollutants the number of times the daily average concentrations exceed the assigned air quality standard (AQS) can be estimated, as well as the level of reduction of particle matter emission sources required to meet the AQS. In this paper three statistical distributions (lognormal, Weibull and type V Pearson distribution) were used to fit the complete set of PM 10 data for the Belgrade urban area during a three-year period (2003–2005). The method of moments and the method of least squares were both used to estimate the parameters of the three theoretical distributions. The type V Pearson distribution represented the PM 10 daily average concentration most closely. However, the parent distributions sometimes diverged in predicting a high PM 10 concentration and therefore asymptotic distributions of extreme values were used to fit the high PM 10 concentration distribution more correctly. This method can successfully predict the return period and exceedances over a critical concentration in succeeding years. The estimated emission source reduction of PM 10 to meet the assigned standard varied from 53% to 63% in the Belgrade urban area. The results provide useful information for air quality management and could be used to examine the similarities and differences among air pollution types in diverse areas.