ARL Weekly News – August 2, 2019

ASMD
In July 2019, Xinrong Ren and a few researchers at the University of Maryland (UMD) conducted research flights over the New York City and Long Island Sound area during the 2019 Long Island Sound Tropospheric Ozone Study (LISTOS). Measurements taken included ozone and its precursors such as nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds. ARL’s air pollutant-measuring equipment, including ozone and sulfur dioxide analyzers were aboard UMD’s research aircraft. The goal of LISTOS is to understand the contributing chemicals, their emission sources, and the underlying weather patterns that influence the formation of ozone events. LISTOS is an ongoing, multi-agency collaborative research project involving NOAA, the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management (lead), U.S. EPA, NASA, state environmental agencies from New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Maine, Massachusetts, and several universities. The study is focusing on the Long Island Sound because the region perpetually suffers from high ozone concentrations and resulting poor air quality that negatively affects the health and well-being of over 20 million people from the New York City metropolitan area to the Atlantic coast of Massachusetts. More information is available at http://www.nescaum.org/documents/listos.

Credit: NOAA