Air Quality Data Summit

Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Research Triangle Park, NC 27711
Conference Room C113
February 12 – 13, 2008

Purpose

Bring together those organizations and individuals with key roles in retrieving, storing, disseminating and analyzing air quality data in order to explore efficient means of leveraging the numerous operations underway, and to assist EPA/OAQPS in defining its role in the larger air quality data community.

Objectives

1. Develop an understanding of various, related air quality data processing programs/systems.
2. Based on 1, consider developing a community-wide strategy that enhances communications across these systems by identifying efficiencies, minimizing redundancies, and addressing user defined needs.
3. Provide guidance to EPA/OAQPS regarding the role of AirQuest to work interactively with these systems and to service broader community needs.

Motivation

Note: This meeting is being driven by a number of events and discussions over the last five years that include:

• perceived frustration and/or misunderstanding in accessing EPA data bases,
• development of user friendly air quality data processing tools by Regional Planning Organizations (RPOs), the Health Effects Institute (HEI) and other organizations
• enhanced emphasis on inter agency collaboration through venues such as GEOSS
• elevated interest in using disparate sources of air quality observations (e.g., surface and satellite data), emissions and model results in conducting assessments
• Recognition of incorporating multiple spatial scales, and therefore a variety of information sources, to address increasing importance of hemispheric transport and climate-air quality interactions, and
• Recommendations from EPA’s Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee’s subcommittee on monitoring encouraging EPA to foster greater access and analysis of air quality data bases.

Agenda

Day 1
(Guidance on the scope and depth of overview talks for this session is needed) see Agenda Design
8:00am Welcome - Wayland
8:10am Goals and organization = Scheffe
8:30am Inventory of Data Systems (15min. ea.) - Dimmick/Keating

• Air Quality System (AQS) - Miller
• CASTNET - Lear
• AIRNow - Dye
• NASA Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs) - Szykman
• NEI & EMF - Houyoux
• Air Quality Modeling Results (e.g., VERDI) - Schewe/Gilliland/Possiel
• Group Discussion

10:15am Break

10:30am Inventory of Data Processing Centers (15 min. ea) - Lorang

• DataFed - Husar
• Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) - Falke
• AirQuest - Dickerson/Cakir
• Visibility Information Exchange Web System (VIEWS) -Schichtel
• HEI Air Quality Data Base - Pun
• Giovanni - Lindsay
• Remote Sensing Information Gateway (RSIG) - Paulsen
• Environmental GeoWeb - Walter
• Group Discussion

12:30pm Lunch

1:30pm Breakout Sessions – addressing three objectives of meeting; Breakout Session Questions

• Group A – IT harmonization / format and obstacles - Dickerson/Falke

(Room Cxxx) Notes: Mangus

• • System Redundancies…wasteful or necessary?
  • Efficient Data Transfer for optimum data display and analysis
  • Integration of Modeling, Emissions, Monitoring, Meteorological and Satellite data
  • Technical and Institutional obstacles
• Group B – User needs - Schichtel/Engel-Cox

(Room Cxxx) Notes: Frank

• • How to best utilize and integrate existing graphical front ends (e.g. VIEWS/AirNow Tech/Air Explorer).
  • User friendly system design to accommodate needs of general public and specialized data analysts.
  • Desired data applications:
    • Access, sort (and aggregate) by time, space and pollutant species key base year and future scenario CMAQ simulations; create tabular and graphical/map displays.
    • Access, sort by time, space and pollutant species, emissions data associated with CMAQ simulations, above; create tabular and graphical/map displays.
    • Access, sort by time, space and pollutant species AQS, IMPROVE, CASTNET ambient, surface-based observations; create tabular and graphical/map displays.
  • Desired Data Applications:
    • Create graphical/map displays generally for CMAQ, emissions, and ambient, surface-based observations
    • Access, sort by time, space and pollutant species NASA satellite data sets available through DataFed-ESIP; Giovanni, AirQuest, RSIG or other repositories.

5:00pm Adjourn

Day 2
8:30am Report out from each group (30min. ea.)

• Group A
• Group B

9:30am Break

9:45 Group Discussion - Young

• Tying pieces together

(Raw data -> Processing Centers <- Enhanced/additional processing)

• Group recommendations
• Role of GEOSS and EPA OEI

11:00 Next Steps - Wayland/Scheffe
11:30am Meeting Adjourn

Participants

Participants -- Air Quality Data Summit (invited as of 12/17/07)

Phil Dickerson* OAQPS

Brad Johns OAQPS

John White OAQPS

Janet Cakir* OAQPS

Nick Mangus* OAQPS

Jon Miller* OAQPS

Norm Possiel* OAQPS

Tyler Fox OAQPS

Doug Solomon OAQPS

Marc Houyoux* OAQPS

Phil Lorang* OAQPS

David Mintz OAQPS

Neil Frank* OAQPS

Tesh Rao OAQPS

Marc Pitchford NPS

Richard Haeuber OAR

Gary Lear* OAR

Melissa Rury OAR

Heidi Paulsen* OEI

Fred Dimmick* ORD

Eric Hall ORD

Tom Scheitlin OEI

Terry Keating* OAR

Steve Young* OEI

Susan Lundquist OEI

Randy Waite OAQPS

Bryan Hubbell OAQPS

Tom Rosendahl OAQPS

Bret Schichtel* NPS

Shawn McClure University

Rudy Husar* University

Stefan Falke* University

Tim Dye* Contractor

Betty Pun* Contractor

Greg Sunshine (will not be able to attend)

L. Friedl NASA

Jim Szykman* NASA

Jill Engel-Cox* Contractor

Frank Lindsay* NASA

Ray Hoff (will not be able to attend)

Uma Shankar University

Sharon Phillips OAQPS

Donna Schwede* ORD

Alice Gilliland * ORD

Gary Walter* ORD

Steve Fine NOAA

Shobha Kondragunta NOAA

Bob Kelly EPA

Rebecca Rosen EPA

Richard Payton EPA Region 8

Mike Gilroy State/Local

Rich Poirot State/Local

Beth Schwehr State/Local

Donna Kenski State/Local

Tom Moore State/Local

N. Kumar (will not be able to attend)

Ken Demergian University

Jeff West ORD

Ted Russell University

Val Garcia ORD

George Allen State/Local

Dirk Felton State/Local

Dick Wertz Consultant

Jay Al-Saadi NASA

Nancy Ritchey NASA

Jim Closs NASA

Ed Lillis OAQPS

Louis Sweeny Consultant

Rob Willis Consultant

Sharon Leduc NOAA

Glenn Rutledge NOAA

Les Hook ORNL

Ken Knowle State/Local

Bill Sukloff Canada

Jerry Johnston OEI

Chet Wayland* OAQPS

Rich Scheffe* OAQPS

Joe Tikvart OAQPS

Bill Lamason OAQPS

• currently listed on agenda

Summary of Air Quality Data, Data Processing, and Data Analysis Systems

Create Data System Profile

AQS

The Air Quality System (AQS) is EPA's repository of ambient air quality data. AQS stores data from over 10,000 monitors, 5000 of which are currently active. State, Local and Tribal agencies collect the data and submit it to AQS on a periodic basis.

CASTNET

The Clean Air Status and Trends Network (CASTNET) is the nation's primary source for data on dry acidic deposition and rural, ground-level ozone. Operating since 1987, CASTNET is used in conjunction with other national monitoring networks to provide information for evaluating the effectiveness of national emission control strategies. CASTNET consists of over 80 sites across the eastern and western United States and is cooperatively operated and funded with the National Park Service.

AIRNow

AIRNow is a Web site that provides the public with easy access to national air quality information. The Web site was developed by EPA, NOAA, NPS, tribal, state, and local agencies and offers daily forecasts of the air quality index (AQI) which is an index for reporting daily air quality. It also provides real-time AQI conditions for over 300 cities across the U.S. and links to more detailed State and local air quality Web sites.

DAACs

The Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAAC's) process, archive, document, and distribute data from NASA’s past and current Earth-observing satellites and field measurement programs. Each center serves a specific Earth-system science discipline and provides users with data products, services, and data-handling tools unique to the center's specialty. User services include: assistance in selecting and obtaining data; access to data-handling and visualization tools; notification of data-related news; and technical support and referrals.

VERDI

Visualization Environment for Rich Data Interpretation (VERDI) has been developed as an alternative to PAVE for analyzing the results of CMAQ. This software tool is written in open-source JAVA and is platform independent. VERDI contains most of the functionality of PAVE as well as additional capabilities. In addition to CMAQ outputs, VERDI can also be used to examine data from the Meteorological-Chemistry Input Processor (MCIP) and the Weather Research and Forecasting Model (WRF). A structured reader is included to facilitate development of capabilities for reading other data files. VERDI is intended to be community-based as the source code will be publicly available and user community contributions will be encouraged.

DataFed

DataFed is Web services-based software that non-intrusively mediates between autonomous, distributed data providers and users. DataFed is designed in accordance with the GEOSS architecture, so that it provides standard interfaces to heterogeneous distributed data, fosters data integration and use with processing services and tools, and collects metadata and user-feedback on datasets. DataFed provides access to over 50 distributed, air-quality relevant datasets which can be explored and analyzed by tools for processing and visualization.

ESIP

The Federation of Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) is a consortium of 90+ organizations that collect, interpret and develop applications for remotely sensed Earth observation information. Included in the ESIP network are NASA, NOAA and USGS data centers, research universities, government research laboratories, supercomputing facilities, commercial enterprises, etc. The ESIP Federation is building the Earth Information Exchange, an interface where earth science data, products and tools will be made available. The interface will be a portal that provides access to the information holdings of member organizations through one web-based location and provides a robust marketplace in which the products and services needed to use and understand this information can be readily acquired. The Exchange will be linked to USGS’s Geospatial One Stop portal, NASA’s Earth Science Gateway, the Global Change Master Directory, and the EOS Clearinghouse, integrating much of the available data and information and making it available through one access point.

AirQuest

AirQuest is an integrated air quality database including data from AQS, AIRNow, the emissions inventory, and CMAQ runs. Working in collaboration with the NASA 3D-AQS project, AirQuest also includes data from satellite sensors and ground-based lidar, formatted to be compatible with EPA monitors and with CMAQ. Data can be visualized through the AirQuest GIS system and are compatible with ArcGIS, GoogleEarth, and SAS.

VIEWS

The Visibility Information Exchange Web System (VIEWS) is an online exchange of air quality data, research, and ideas designed to understand the effects of air pollution on visibility and to support the Regional Haze Rule enacted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to reduce regional haze and improve visibility in national parks and wilderness areas.

HEI Air Quality Database

The HEI Air Quality Database focuses on levels of PM2.5 components and gaseous pollutants at and near sites in the EPA's PM2.5 Chemical Speciation Trends Network (STN) and State, Local and Tribal air monitoring stations (SLAMS). The Database is available to investigators interested in using the information for studies on air quality and health. Currently, the Database contains information on speciated PM components and gaseous pollutants at these sites for the years 2000-2006 and it is anticipated that the information will be updated regularly over the next 1-2 years.

Giovanni

Giovanni stands for the "Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC) Interactive Online Visualization ANd Analysis Infrastructure." It is a Web-based application developed by GES DISC that provides a simple and intuitive way to visualize, analyze, and access vast amounts of Earth science remote sensing data without having to download the data.

RSIG

The Remote Sensing Information Gateway (RSIG) provides a way for users to get the multi-terabyte, environmental dataset they want via an interactive, Web browser-based application. With RSIG users are able to download and parse files (environmental data and models) in minutes, and to integrate selected datasets into a unified visualization.

Environmental Geoweb

Environmental Geoweb involves geospatial technologies for accessing and visualization of earth science information (focus on satellite data and “layering” capability).