Health. The Seneca Foundation supports a UMU project to create a modeling service to predict pollution levels in small and medium-sized cities
Cities have a legal obligation to ensure the quality of the air their citizens breathe; citizens who are increasingly aware of what they breathe. However, the vast majority of local authorities lack the resources to reliably measure, monitor and predict air pollution levels. In particular, the medium and small towns that make up almost all the municipalities of the Region of Murcia and the neighboring municipalities need a monitoring system of these characteristics and do not have the resources to carry it out with their own staff.
Internationally, too, organizations are increasing the pressure on this responsibility of municipalities, which presents them with both a technical and an economic challenge. In most situations, it is undoubtedly more feasible and profitable for a small/medium-sized municipality to hire this service from a third-party provider, as there are no companies providing this service at a technical and economic level that the municipalities can afford.
From the Department of Chemical Technology of the University of Murcia, they have worked with some of the municipalities of the region that have started to monitor air quality, but without implementing forecast models, because they knew first-hand that the municipalities as well as its shortcomings. Based on this experience, they decided to set up an air quality monitoring and forecasting service of a high technical level and at the same time affordable for the municipalities of the region, thanks to the help of the Seneca Foundation within the framework of its ‘Proof of Concept’.
Given the complication of air quality modelling, it is essential to have specific software and advanced knowledge in the discipline for its proper use and interpretation. For this reason, the research team is multidisciplinary and works towards achieving the objectives of the Department of Chemical Engineering, with more than 50 publications in the line of personal exposure to air pollutants and reports produced for the European Commission and for the organization World Health Organization on this topic; and mathematics, with experience in computer modeling and simulation of physical and engineering phenomena.
In this way, the professors María Isabel Aguilar and Antonia Baeza, as well as the predoctoral researcher of the Seneca Foundation María del Mar Durán and professor Mercedes Llorens of the Department of Chemical Engineering, together with Francisco Esquembre, professor of the UMU Department of Mathematics.
This system (data platform + innovative model + sensor network) will be of particular interest to cities that have problems complying with pollution limits. “It will be a tool to be able to predict future situations of high pollution episodes and also hypothetical situations where it is necessary to estimate what the atmospheric situation would be in case of change actions,” says Antonia Baeza. With this tool, municipalities can design mitigation, adaptation, impact reduction and early warning actions for the population to reduce exposure to pollutants. And by correcting or reducing high-impact situations, environmental indicators will improve, as will citizen exposure.
Use of the “Software” requires additional training, which is intended for those who have this prior knowledge. Therefore, in addition to the model, they will advise on setting up a modest, but sufficient network of measuring equipment at certain points in each city, as not all sensors are the same and should not be installed anywhere. The group has specific technical knowledge of sensors and suitable locations as well as expensive calibration instruments and fine-tuning of air quality measuring equipment.
The municipality managers will have a user interface at their disposal, the use of which will be the subject of training by the work team of this ‘Proof of concept’. With this easy-to-use interface, the municipality’s technicians have both real-time information and air quality forecasts within days.
Finally, the package will include a subscription service to set up a data server that will perform the model’s daily forecast and receive the measurements from the municipal sensors and combine them appropriately with that forecast. The result will be the real-time source of information to serve the board, which will also serve to improve the parameters of the model. The work team also has the knowledge to install and maintain a server with these characteristics, and to design and develop a user interface that provides access to the information collected by the teams and produced by the model.
“We are convinced that the market potential of this service is very broad, as the current regulations already impose this obligation on all municipalities. But, as we said, they often cannot perform this task with the resources at their disposal and so they need our help to do it,” added Baeza.
Municipalities will use this information to monitor pollution in their municipality and to design or implement mitigation and/or warning actions for the population in case of high pollution episodes. In the event that city councils decide to provide this information to citizens through real-time telematics, the team will design a mobile application that will provide regulated access to server data.
As a whole, the benefits to citizens are fundamental to their health, as they are exposed to less polluting gas emissions, and to their well-being, as they are aware that they are adopting more sustainable patterns of behavior and contribute to improving the environment. In the latter aspect, it provides climate benefits by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and reducing the intensity of the ‘heat island’ effect in the urban centers of the study. It will also contribute to achieving the goals of the European Council of Municipal Councils to Combat Climate Change (GCMCE) and the Sustainable Development Goals.
“This proof of concept will also help reduce the number of deaths and illnesses caused by hazardous chemicals and air pollution. Likewise, it will make it easier for cities to adopt and apply integrated climate change mitigation and adaptation policies and plans, and to reduce the per capita adverse environmental impact of air quality in the city of Murcia,” adds to the professor.
As for the economic benefit that will be gained from the proof of concept, it should be noted that the average cost of treatment per patient and per year in Spain for a patient with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in 2004 ranged from 7,877.13 euros in cases of mild , 16,557.12 euros in moderate and 33,081.16 euros in serious. “These patients would improve their health and these costs would be significantly reduced,” clarifies Baeza. Added to this is the reduction in the symptoms of Covid-19 due to the reduction of polluting gases in the inhaled air.
The project will end in 2022 and, once the pilot system is complete, the results of the ‘Proof of Concept’ will be encapsulated in a product that will be offered and implemented for interested cities, creating interfaces and platforms adapted to the configuration and characteristics of each city.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Wayne Wickman, a professional journalist and author for Today Times Live. My specialty is covering global news and current events, offering readers a unique perspective on the world’s most pressing issues. I’m passionate about storytelling and helping people stay informed on the goings-on of our planet.
