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Abstract
Tropospheric ozone concentrations for Kansas City are well known on a regional scale. The Kansas City, Missouri, ground-level ozone (GLO) project measured outdoor ozone concentrations using passive sensing devices (PSDs) on a neighborhood scale. Highly resolved exposure maps were made based on the detailed air quality observations collected during the seven week sampling study during the summer of 2005. Data analysis demonstated that ozone concentration levels were higher in urban core neighborhoods compared to the surrounding surbuban areas. The results have negative implications for the respiratory health of residents of urban Kansas City.
Introduction
Ground-level ozone (GLO) is a secondary air pollutant formed by photochemical reactions involving oxides of nitrogen (NO ) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), mainly hydrocarbons. Sources of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and VOCs are primarily anthropogenic, generally produced during combustion processes from automobile emissions and industrial activities. High levels of ozone are known to increase breathing difficulty for people that suffer from asthma, heart disease, and emphysema. Ozone increases the number of cases of bronchitis in children and senior citizens. Long-term exposure can even cause healthy young adults to experience breathing difficulty, especially if they exercise or work outdoors. Average ozone concentrations and the related negative health impacts are expected to increase with climate change (Bell et al., 2007).
Ozone is the result of the emissions of the precursors, the reactions and their rates that change the precursors to ozone, and meteorology, which determines dispersion (Banta et al., 2005). The peak in ozone is expected to occur upwind of the source area. A network of strategically placed continuous monitors provides high-resolution temporal data across a wide regional area. The upwind sites are designed to measure the baseline ozone levels, unaffected by the metropolitan air conditions. The downwind sites are located to capture the peak ozone concentration, given the hourslong formation time for ozone. The urban site is designed to measure maximum population exposure. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) recommends that the maximum population exposure monitor location be in a suburb in the urban fringe slightly downwind of the urban area (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency [U.S. EPA], 1998).
The density of an ozone network is based on the purpose of the network. Ozone is most frequently measured at the...