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Atmospheric Environment 41 (2007) 71277137 www.elsevier.com/locate/atmosenv

The effects of meteorology on ozone in urban areas and their use in assessing ozone trends
Louise Camaliera,, William Coxa, Pat Dolwickb
b

Ofce of Air Quality, Planning, and Standards, US Environmental Protection Agency, RTP, NC 27711, USA Ofce of Air Quality, Planning, and Standards, National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, RTP, NC 27711, USA Received 28 February 2007; received in revised form 23 April 2007; accepted 25 April 2007

Abstract The United States Environmental Protection Agency issues periodic reports that describe air quality trends in the US. For some pollutants, such as ozone, both observed and meteorologically adjusted trends are displayed. This paper describes an improved statistical methodology for meteorologically adjusting ozone trends as well as characterizes the relationships between individual meteorological parameters and ozone. A generalized linear model that accommodates the nonlinear effects of the meteorological variables was t to data collected for 39 major eastern US urban areas. Overall, the model performs very well, yielding R2 statistics as high as 0.80. The analysis conrms that ozone is generally increasing with increasing temperature and decreasing with increasing relative humidity. Examination of the spatial gradients of these responses show that the effect of temperature on ozone is most pronounced in the north while the opposite is true of relative humidity. By including HYSPLIT-derived transport wind direction and distance in the model, it is shown that the largest incremental impact of wind direction on ozone occurs along the periphery of the study domain, which encompasses major NOx emission sources. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Keywords: Ozone trends; Generalized linear model; Meteorological adjustment; HYSPLIT; Spatial patterns

1. Introduction The United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) issues periodic reports that describe the status and trends of air quality throughout the US (US Environmental Protection Agency, 2005). Because inter-annual meteorological variations are known to affect daily and seasonal average ozone concentrations, EPA often uses statistical techniques to reduce the effect that meteorological
Corresponding author.

E-mail address: Camalier.Louise@epa.gov (L. Camalier). 1352-2310/$ - see front matter Published by Elsevier Ltd. doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2007.04.061

variations have on ozone trends (US Environmental Protection Agency, 2005). Results from these periodic reports have typically been based on a relatively limited suite of meteorological parameters. The purpose of this paper is to describe an improved version of the statistical model for meteorologically adjusting ozone trends that (1) accommodates the non-linear effects of the meteorological variables, and (2) includes a much more comprehensive suite of meteorological variables than were used in previous analyses (Cox and Chu, 1993, 1996). The meteorological adjustment analysis focuses on urban areas located in the eastern US primarily

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because the number and spatial distribution of urban areas is sufcient to identify geographic patterns of the ozone response to meteorology. The initial analysis identies the effect of each meteorological parameter on ozone at the 39 selected eastern urban areas. Also examined is the spatial distribution of these meteorological effects on ozone, including the effects of temperature, relative humidity and wind direction. The 39 urban areas used in the analysis are a subset of 53 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) that have been used in an EPA report (US Environmental Protection Agency, 2004) on recent air quality trends. 2. Technical approach There are numerous publications that describe methods for adjusting measured ozone for the effects of meteorology (Bloomeld et al., 1996; Thompson et al., 2001; Davis et al., 1998). As previously used in Zheng et al. (2006), this analysis employs a generalized linear model (GLM) to describe the relationship between urban ozone and selected meteorological parameters taken from an extensive array of candidate meteorological variables. A separate model was t for each urban area using the GLM modeling function in the R software environment (R Development Core Team, 2006). The GLM can be written as follows: gmi bo f 1 xi;1 . . . f j xi;j . . . f p xi;p k Wd Y. 1 The subscript, i, indicates the ith days observation, j, indicates the jth meteorological variable, where j 1, y, p, and the subscript, k, indicates the kth year. The parameter bo represents the overall mean and f ( ) is the smoothing function where fj (xi,j) is the value of the smoothing function associated with the ith value of the explanatory variable j. The term, Wd, represents the effect of the dth day of the week, where d 1, 2, y, 7 (Sunday to Saturday, respectively). The term, Yk, represents the effect of the kth year on ozone, i.e. the meteorologically adjusted value of ozone for that year, where k 1997, 1998, y, 2005. The element, g (mi), represents the link function (McCullagh and Nelder, 1989), which species the relationship between the linear formulation on the right side of Eq. (1) and the expected response, the mi. Diagnostic evaluation of alternative link

functions indicates that a log link is the most appropriate for these data. A natural spline (Hastie and Tibshirani, 1990) was employed to allow for a non-linear response between each meteorological parameter and ozone concentration. A natural spline was also applied to a term used to account for seasonal changes. As noted in the Introduction, previous analyses (Cox and Chu, 1993, 1996) have been conned to a relatively small array of meteorological parameters. To expand upon the suite of meteorological variables that may have some impact on ozone concentrations, a more comprehensive data base has been assembled by EPA containing an extensive array of both hourly and daily meteorological parameters. The enhanced meteorological database consists of nearly 700 meteorological sites across the US and covers the period from 1995 to 2006. The raw surface meteorological data are extracted from the integrated surface hourly (ISH) database while the raw upper air data is extracted from the Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive (IGRA) databases, both of which are maintained by National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). The surface data and upper air data are joined by pairing each surface site with its nearest upper-air neighbor. The data pairing was only done for upper-air sites considered to be spatially representative of the nearest surface site. A complete description of the omnibus data base along with a map showing the locations of meteorological stations can be found on the scram website at: http://www.epa. gov/scram001/meteorology/omnibus_meteorological_ data_set.pdf. The daily meteorological parameters considered in this analysis are shown in Table 1. Some of the variables are directly observed, while others are calculated based on hourly data or other observed parameters. In addition, transportrelated variables were created based on the hybrid single-particle Lagrangian integrated trajectory (HYSPLIT) trajectory model simulations (Draxler and Hess, 1997). The HYSPLIT model was run for each day of the data record to calculate 24-h backward trajectories from each surface site. The trajectories were started at noon LST at a height of 300 m (i.e., within the mixed layer). Fig. 1 shows the results of a single HYSPLIT trajectory for Cleveland on 7 June 2005 and illustrates how transport wind direction and transport distance are determined. The ozone air quality data used in the analysis was taken from EPAs air quality system (AQS)

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L. Camalier et al. / Atmospheric Environment 41 (2007) 71277137 Table 1 List of daily meteorological parameters that comprise the expanded meteorological data base and considered as part of the adjustment model Parameter type Temperature ( 1C) Parameter 7129

Maximum surface temperature Morning and afternoon average temperature Diurnal temperature change Minimum, maximum, and average apparent temperature 1200 UTC temperatures at 925, 850, 700, and 500 mb Deviation in temperature from a 10 year monthly mean at 850, 700, and 500 mb 24-h change in 1200 UTC 850 mb temperatures Average daily u and v wind vectors Average daily wind speed and direction Morning and afternoon average u and v wind vectors Morning and afternoon average wind speed and direction Average daily relative humidity (%) Midday and nighttime average relative humidity (%) Average and maximum dew point temperature ( 1C) Maximum water vapor mixing ratio (g kg1) Morning 850 mb dew point temperature ( 1C) 24-h change in 1200 UTC 850 mb dew point temperatures ( 1C) Average station and sea-level pressure Morning geo-potential height at 850, 700, and 500 mb Deviation in geo-potential height from a 10 year monthly mean at 850, 700, and 500 mb Difference in 1200 UTC temperatures between surface and 850 ( 1C) Maximum afternoon mixing height (m) Maximum rate of mixing height increase (m h1) 24-h HYSPLIT transport direction and distance (1, km) X, Y, and Z components of the 24-h HYSPLIT trajectory 24-h scalar wind run (m) Average morning and afternoon fractional cloud cover (%) Total precipitation (in) Binary indicators of the occurrence of rain, haze, and fog Fig. 1. HYSPLIT trajectory (red) diagram for the Cleveland vicinity on 7 June 2005.

Wind (m s1)

Humidity

Pressure (mb)

Stability

maximum 8-h ozone concentration is extracted from AQS for each monitoring site within each urban area. For analysis purposes, the highest 8-h average among the monitoring stations in an urban area was selected to represent the ozone air quality for each day. The data included the months from May to September (i.e. the ozone season) for each year from 1997 to 2005. Finally, the modeling database for each urban area was created by merging the daily ozone data with the daily meteorological data described above. Data from the meteorological station nearest to the center of an urban area was chosen to represent the meteorology for that urban area. The resulting modeling data base for each urban area was a matrix of approximately 1300 days (9 years times 153 summer days) by 60 meteorological variables. 3. Model development Standard, non-automated methods were used to identify the most important meteorological variables. The selection process included backward one variable deletion based on the F-statistic (Venables and Ripley, 2002) along with diagnostic checks such as the examination of model residuals. Variables that were highly correlated with one another and those which offered little explanatory power are excluded early in the screening process (Harrell, 2001). The screening process is applied for each urban area separately and examined for consistency among all 39 areas. For example, daily maximum 1-h temperature was statistically signicant for 36 of the 39 urban areas and therefore was

Transport trajectories

Synoptic weather

(http://www.epa.gov/ttn/airs/airsaqs/index.htm). For consistency with EPAs ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS), the daily

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retained. The screening process resulted in a subset of eight variables from the list of candidate meteorological variables (Table 1) and this subset was then used in all subsequent modelings. The eight variables used in the model are listed in Table 2. For each meteorological parameter, the Number of cities column represents the number of cites for which the parameter is statistically signicant at the a 0.001 level. The predictive power of the model as measured by the R2 statistic, ranges from 0.56 (Tampa) to 0.80. Fig. 2 shows an interpolated surface of the R2 statistic for each urban area computed by using all of the predicted and observed daily maximum 8-h ozone values from the 9-year period.

4. Meteorological effects on ozone The parameter estimates obtained from the model provide insight into the nature of the ozones response to each meteorological variable. The individual effects of the most important meteorological parameters on ozone are examined for an example area (Cleveland, OH), followed by an examination of the spatial distribution of the ozone response among all 39 urban areas. Next, the impact on ozone trends is examined with a discussion of how inter-annual meteorological variations affect the adjustment process. 4.1. Individual meteorological effects on ozone Each variable plays a unique role in explaining variations in ozone through its own particular response, or effect. For example, increasing temperature is usually associated with increasing ozone, while increasing wind speed is usually associated with decreasing ozone (i.e. dilution effect). Because many of the meteorological effects are non-linear, a partial response plot offers an intuitive way to reveal the relationship between ozone and meteorological variables. A partial response curve shows the effect of a particular meteorological variable on ozone after accounting for the effects of all the other variables. Thus, the partial response curve accounts for any inter-correlation that may exist among the explanatory variables. Fig. 3 displays the partial response of ozone to each of four meteorological variables using data for the Cleveland urban area. Because a log-link function is used in the tting process, the y-axis represents the log of ozone concentrations after adjusting for the overall average. As visible in the upper-left quadrant in Fig. 3, the effect of temperature is relatively small for temperatures below the threshold of $20 1C, but is very pronounced above that point. The individual response curves for relative humidity and transport distance are decreasing and approximately loglinear over the range of data. Since transport distance measures the distance traveled by the air mass within the 24-h period, larger transport distances are associated with higher transport wind speeds, which act in the dilution of ozone and precursor gases. As higher humidity levels are usually associated with greater cloud abundance and atmospheric instability, the photochemical

Table 2 Meteorological parameters used in the model and frequency of signicance Meteorological parameters Number of cities (out of 39) 36 37 16 27 30

Daily maximum temperature ( 1C) Mid day average (10 am4 pm average) relative humidity (%) Morning (710 am) average wind speed (m s1) Afternoon (14 pm) average wind speed (m s1) Morning surface temperature difference ($1200 UTC) (temperature at 925 mbtemperature at surface) ( 1C) Deviation in 1200 UTC temperature of 850 mb surface from 10-year monthly average ( 1C) Transport direction (degrees clockwise from North) Transport distance (km)

17

37 35

Fig. 2. Spatial Interpolation of the R2 statistic for predicted vs. observed daily maximum 8-h ozone.

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Fig. 3. Partial response of ozone to selected meteorological parametersCleveland, OH. Dashed lines are 95% condence bounds for the response.

process is slowed and ground level ozone is depleted. The ozone response to transport direction in Cleveland is nearly uni-modal. The mode indicates the direction from where the highest incremental impact on ozone occurs. In this case, the highest incremental impact on ozone is associated with transport winds originating in the south and southwest, while the lowest impact occurs from winds originating from the north. The 95% condence bounds on each partial effect plot are very narrow, indicating greater certainty in the predicted response in the more dense portions of the data. It is interesting to compare the sensitivity of ozone obtained from this particular study with similar sensitivity results obtained from studies using a numerical air quality model (Dawson et al., 2007). As noted, an example given in the Dawson article based on a July 2001 episode indicates that daily maximum 8-h ozone concentration in Atlanta increases by approximately 4 ppb 2.5 K1 ($1.6 ppb K1). This result compares favorably with the sensitivity to temperature found from this study. For example, the ozone response to temperature in Atlanta is approximately 3.4% K1 (Fig. 4). Since the seasonal average ozone in Atlanta for 2001 is approximately 60 ppb, the ozone sensitivity to temperature equates to $2 ppb increase in ozone K1.

Fig. 4. Percent change in ozone 1 1C1 increase in daily maximum 1-h temperature.

4.2. Spatial distribution of meteorological effects on ozone Although each urban area is modeled independently, there are distinct spatial patterns in the response of each of the most important meteorological predictors. Since the ozone response for most of the variables has at least some degree of nonlinearity, presenting a spatial picture of the entire non-linear response is difcult. As an alternative, a linear approximation of the effect of a particular

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meteorological variable on ozone is calculated using the central 50% of the data. The approximate linear effect (i.e. ozone response) is dened as the difference between the ozone predicted by the model at the 75%-tile and the 25%-tile of the meteorological variable, divided by the difference between these two percentiles. The approximate linear effect of maximum temperature on ozone is illustrated as a slope in Fig. 5. The effect, or slope, is thus an approximate rate of change in ozone that is predicted to occur as the maximum temperature varies from a typical low to typical high value. The effect can also be expressed as percent change in ozone per a 1 1C increase in temperature (% change slope 100). Fig. 4 shows the spatial distribution of the approximate linear effect of temperature on ozone, expressed as percent change in ozone 1 1C1 increase in temperature. Generally, the temperature effect is positive and clearly has the largest impact in the North and Northeast portions of the domain. In the vicinity of the Great Lakes, a 1 1C increase in temperature is associated with about a 4% increase in ozone. Urban areas along the eastern seaboard have the largest ozone response to temperature (approximately 5%). The magnitude of the temperature effect gradually decreases southward and diminishes to below 1% 1C1 in the Gulf Coast regions. Fig. 6 shows the spatial distribution of the approximate linear effect of relative humidity on ozone. The relative humidity effect is largely negative with greatest impact in the southern urban areas and less pronounced for the more northern

Fig. 6. Percent change in ozone per 1% increase in mid-day relative humidity.

Fig. 7. Effect of 24-h transport wind on ozone concentration. The arrows show the transport wind direction associated with the largest incremental increase in ozone; the length of the arrow is proportional to the increase in ozone concentration accompanying the indicated direction.

Fig. 5. Schematic for the calculation of an approximate linear effect of maximum temperature on ozone.

urban areas. Differing spatial dependency of meteorological effects could be due to the fact that the maximum temperature varies more in the northern areas as they experience summertime cold fronts, which typically do not reach further south. The direction of transport can play an important role in the formation and movement of ozone. To characterize the effects of the transport direction on ozone, Fig. 7 is used to show the spatial pattern of the directional effects among the urban areas. The arrows on the map in Fig. 7 indicate the direction of transport wind associated with the largest incremental increase in ozone concentration; transport winds indicate the direction from which the wind is coming, as they are based on backward trajectories.

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The length of each arrow is proportional to the magnitude of the incremental increase (or effect). Referring back to the bottom-left quadrant of Fig. 3 for Cleveland, the highest incremental ozone is associated with transport winds originating from the southwest ($2002501, clockwise from North). Overall, the spatial pattern shows that urban areas with the largest response to transport winds are located along the periphery of the domain, while urban areas in the central portion of the domain are associated with the smallest directional impact (Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio and West Virginia). A general explanation for this pattern is that the largest ozone producing sources of NOx emissions (US Environmental Protection Agency, 2005) are located near the central portion of the eastern US, where air masses are more stagnant and individual transport directions are less important. The perimeter urban areas, including the Northeastern US, upper Midwest, and Gulf Coast, appear to indicate at least some impact of transport from the central portion of the domain (CAIR Modeling Analysis, http://www.epa.gov/cair/pdfs/naltech02. pdf); an exception may be the southeast Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast. As noted previously, only the transport direction associated with the largest incremental impact is indicated in Fig. 7. While the gure is convenient for conveying the overall pattern, the one arrow approach can mask variations in directional impact especially in urban areas that indicate impact from more than one principal direction. For example, urban areas in the Gulf coast region, including Beaumont, TX and Baton Rouge, LA, show a bidirectional impact of transport direction (Fig. 8). One possible reason for this is the existence and location of large sources of VOC emissions (e.g., petrochemical processes around Houston and southern Louisiana). Finally, it is important to note that individual ozone episodes may be driven by sourcereceptor linkages that are not reected in the average transport wind effect. All variables selected to be in the model have at least some impact on ozone. However, because the model is t separately for each urban area, each city can have different prevailing meteorological parameters which drive the ozone response. The two prevailing meteorological parameters for each city displayed in Fig. 9 are those with the largest F-statistics. The map synthesizes the dominating meteorological parameters in each area, illustrating the geographic zones of meteorological inuence

Fig. 8. Partial response of ozone to transport wind direction for Gulf Coast urban areas demonstrates the potential for multiple directions of high impact.

(bands of color). The information conveyed in Fig. 9 conrms the existence of spatially consistent patterns in the aggregate effects of the meteorological drivers on ozone. As previously seen by the spatial effects maps, day-to-day variations in temperature play the most signicant impact on ozone in the north while day-to-day variations in relative humidity have a more dominant effect on ozone in the south. Both relative humidity and temperature play comparable roles in the midportion of the eastern US. The outskirts/coasts of the extreme north and south are driven heavily by transport parameters. Other meteorological parameters are included in the model, as well as a term to account for day of week effects. The spatial effects of these additional parameters have been explored, and some interesting geographic patterns have been found. For example, some geographic patterns of day of week effects have been observed. In the northeastern US and the Great Lakes area, such as Detroit, weekends seem to be associated with higher ozone concentrations while weekdays seem to be associated with lower ozone values. Interestingly, in the southeastern US area, the day of week effect on ozone appears to be reversed, with weekdays being more associated with higher ozone concentrations. 4.3. Aggregate meteorological effects on ozone trends The original motivation for improving the statistical model described in this paper is to better

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Fig. 9. Geographic zones of dominating meteorological inuence, based on the F statistics of the meteorological parameters.

understand ambient ozone trends, especially in those urban areas affected by the implementation of control programs (US Environmental Protection Agency, 2005). Fig. 10 illustrates the effect of meteorological adjustment on ozone concentrations using the Cleveland urban area as an example. The vertical axis is the daily maximum 8-h ozone value for each ozone season between 1997 and 2005. The dotted line represents the actual, observed concentration data, while the solid line connects the meteorologically adjusted seasonal ozone averages (i.e. the term, Yk, in Eq. (1)). The standard error for each of the meteorologically adjusted averages is $23%. The meteorologically adjusted ozone trend shown in Fig. 10 is generally smoother than the observed ozone trend, showing less of the inter-annual variability that is mainly caused by inter-annual uctuations in meteorology. The direction and magnitude of the adjustments in Fig. 10 can be largely explained by the direction and magnitude of the relative humidity and temperature anomalies from year to year. To illustrate, Fig. 11 shows the relative humidity and temperature anomaly for 2004 and 2005 for each urban area, where the anomaly is calculated as the difference between the mean for a given years ozone season and the 9-year ozone season average. The average temperature in 2004 is generally lower than the 9-year average, especially in the Midwest and Great Lakes regions. Temperature anomalies in the following year contrast with 2004, with 2005 temperatures warmer than the 9year average.

Fig. 10. Observed vs. meteorologically adjusted ozone trends for Cleveland, OH.

Anomalies during the ozone season for relative humidity in 2004 and 2005 are also noticeably different. Average humidity values in 2004 are much higher than the 9-year average, especially in the Midwest and Northeast areas. The relative humidity anomaly in 2005 is in general, opposite and more extreme than the 2004 anomaly, where average humidity in 2005 is much lower than the composite 9-year average. The combined effect of higher-thanaverage temperature and lower-than-average humidity in 2005 contributes to the downward adjustment in ozone in 2005. Similarly, the combined effect of lower-than-average temperature and higher-than-average humidity in 2004 contributes to the upward adjustment in ozone.

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Fig. 11. Temperature and relative humidity anomalies for the ozone seasons of 2004 and 2005. Each anomaly is measured as the difference between the average for the given year and the 9-year average. Negative values are lower than average and positive values are higher than average.

Fig. 12. Meteorological adjustment to ozone (%). Positive values indicate an upward adjustment and negative values indicate a downward adjustment in ozone.

Because meteorological effects on ozone generally occur on a regional scale, adjustments within the same general geographic area are expected to be similar. To examine this issue, a yearly adjustment percentage is calculated for each urban area and displayed geographically (Fig. 12). The adjustment percentage is calculated via adjustment% Oadj Oraw 100, Oraw

where Oadj is the meteorologically adjusted ozone (i.e. the year effect) and Oraw is the raw average

ozone. Positive values indicate an upward adjustment while negative values indicate a downward adjustment. The adjustment values for 2004 were predominately positive, which means that 2004 seasonal ozone averages were adjusted upward in most urban areas. Overall, the adjustments in 2004 range from $4 to 8% throughout the central and north central portions of the domain. In contrast, adjustments in 2005 were mostly negative with the largest adjustments in the Midwest and Great Lakes region. The smallest downward adjustments are generally conned to the southeast.

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Fig. 13. Comparison of average ozone between 2004 and 2005 (top two quadrants). The bottom two quadrants show the percent difference in ozone between 2005 and 2004, before and after meteorological adjustment. Since the standard error, obtained from bootstrapping, is $23%, the resulting margin of error for percent change is $5 percentage points.

Fig. 13 illustrates the importance of using meteorological adjustment methods when trying to interpret differences in air quality levels between 2 years. The top two quadrants show the seasonal average of daily maximum 8-h ozone for 2004 and 2005. Ozone concentrations in 2005 are much higher than ozone concentrations in 2004. In 2004, ozone values higher than 60 ppb are conned to a small region; while in 2005, ozone values greater than 60 ppb dominate most of the domain. The bottom two quadrants show the percent difference between 2005 and 2004 in average ozone, before and after meteorological adjustment. Percent differences in observed ozone are most pronounced in the western portion of the domain, where differences peak above 20%. After adjusting for meteorology, percent differences between the 2 years are insignificant. To estimate the signicance of the percent changes shown in Fig. 13, a 3-day, non-overlapping, blocked bootstrap (Davison and Hinkley, 1999; Hastie and Tibshirani, 1990) is used to estimate the standard error ($23 percentage points) of the percent change in ozone. Only a few urban areas have adjusted changes which exceed twice the bootstrap estimated standard error. It can be concluded that the increase in ozone concentrations

from 2004 to 2005 is driven mainly by meteorological differences between the two years and not due to a fundamental shift in air quality. 5. Concluding remarks and future applications In 2004, the National Research Council issued a report entitled Air Quality Management in the United States (NRC, 2004), providing several recommendations regarding improved decisionmaking in the context of environmental health and air quality. One of the major recommendations is to better track air quality progress in order to enable more informed evaluations of past and present air policy decisions. In order to track progress toward air quality goals, routine air quality trend analyses are needed to conrm if emission controls are indeed reducing pollutant concentrations. Meteorological adjustment of ozone concentrations provides a method to examine the underlying effects of control programs apart from the random inter-annual effects of meteorology. The benets of accounting for meteorological conditions when examining air quality trends have been demonstrated in numerous publications over the past decade. This paper expands on previous analyses

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through an improved regression method as well as the inclusion of several new variables provided by the HYSPLIT trajectory model. The authors are beginning to explore the application of similar methods for quantifying the effects of meteorological conditions on PM2.5 and PM2.5 components, specically sulfates, nitrates and organic carbon. Such pollutants are much more complex than ozone and thus present unique challenges for statistical modeling and for gaining a more complete understanding of the effect of meteorology on PM2.5 concentrations. There is a growing interest in understanding and quantifying the global effects of climate change on the environment. Advances in statistical modeling of the relationship between air quality and meteorology should help corroborate the results being obtained from numerical simulations which predict the response of air quality to changes in climate conditions. The knowledge gained by contrasting the simulated and observed response to meteorology should provide additional insight into the likely long-term effects of climate change on air quality levels.

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