Ambient air quality monitoring network design for assessing human health impacts from exposures to airborne particulate matter

Existing methods for establishing ambient air quality monitoring networks typically evaluate only parameters related to ambient concentrations of the contaminant(s) of interest or population distributions in the area of interest. However, adverse health risks from exposures to airborne contaminants are a function of the contaminant concentration and the anatomic and physiologic characteristics of the exposed population. Thus, ambient air quality monitoring networks designed for the protection of public health or for epidemiological studies evaluating adverse health impacts from exposures to ambient air contaminants should account for both contaminant characteristics and human health parameters. A methodology has been developed which establishes ambient air quality monitoring networks for assessments of adverse human health impacts from exposures to airborne contaminants by incorporating human health risk assessment techniques. Additional components of an air quality monitoring network, including the equipment used to collect samples and the frequency of sample collection, have also been evaluated.;Results of an evaluation in three communities that compared the risk assessment design method with traditional methods of monitoring network design, locating sites at the points of maximum concentration or maximum population, indicated that the risk assessment based method better predicted the location of adverse, non-carcinogenic health effects than the traditional methods. Spearman rank correlation coefficient, rs, values were significantly greater than the values obtained using the concentration method for all comparative analyses. The risk assessment method rs values were also significantly greater than the values obtained using the population method for all but one of the comparative analyses. However, for this one analysis, the number of respiratory illness diagnoses identified by the risk assessment method was thirty-eight percent greater than the diagnoses identified by the population method. Overall, the risk assessment method always identified the same number or more respiratory illness diagnoses as the population and concentration methods for all comparative analyses.;This research also described the performance of the portable miniVOL particulate matter sampler. Sampler precision based on co-located measurements achieved a Pearson's correlation coefficient, r2, value of 0.96 for PM10 and 0.95 for PM2.5. Comparative measurements with an EPA equivalent method dichotomous sampler yielded a r2 value of 0.85 while a r2 value of 0.90 was obtained in comparison with an EPA equivalent method continuous sampler. Results of the frequency assessment indicated that short term excursions in particulate matter concentrations were missed by using time averaged monitoring methods. The extent of some of these excursions exceeded three times the average value during the study.