Air quality continues to improve in many urban areas across the US, but progress in rural environments has been slower. Generally, areas at urban/rural interfaces experience some of the most persistent air quality problems. Mixing of urban NOx emissions with agricultural volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions can lead to formation of ozone (O3) and secondary organic aerosol (SOA). Transport of agricultural pesticides and inactive ingredients to unintended areas contributes to both atmospheric pollution and water quality issues. The focus of this paper will be based on three separate studies that demonstrate how increased knowledge of urban and agricultural emissions can enhance the accuracy of computational modeling and further our understanding of the affects of these emissions on air quality. In one study, detailed air quality model calculations were used to evaluate rigorously surface-level ozone concentrations from animal feed emissions and to compare this source to other leading VOC sources. Results demonstrated the effect of animal feed VOC emissions on actual ozone concentrations in the San Joaquin Valley (SJV) while at the same time evaluating the efficacy of VOC versus NOx controls in the SJV. In a continuation of this study, the affect of NOx emissions from animal these feed sources were considered and compared to NOx emissions from urban sources. In the final study we untilized the Pesticide Emissions Model to generate emissions inventories that will feed directly into regional transportation models.

Agricultural influences on air quality from California's San Joaquin Valley to the Chesapeake Bay area

246th National Meeting (2013)

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