Comparison of spatiotemporal prediction models of daily exposure of individuals to ambient nitrogen dioxide and ozone in Montreal, Canada

BACKGROUND

In previous studies investigating the short-term health effects of ambient air pollution the exposure metric that is often used is the daily average across monitors, thus assuming that all individuals have the same daily exposure. Studies that incorporate space-time exposures of individuals are essential to further our understanding of the short-term health effects of ambient air pollution.

OBJECTIVES

As part of a longitudinal cohort study of the acute effects of air pollution that incorporated subject-specific information and medical histories of subjects throughout the follow-up, the purpose of this study was to develop and compare different prediction models using data from fixed-site monitors and other monitoring campaigns to estimate daily, spatially-resolved concentrations of ozone (O₃) and nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) of participants' residences in Montreal, 1991-2002.

METHODS

We used the following methods to predict spatially-resolved daily concentrations of O₃ and NO₂ for each geographic region in Montreal (defined by three-character postal code areas): (1) assigning concentrations from the nearest monitor; (2) spatial interpolation using inverse-distance weighting; (3) back-extrapolation from a land-use regression model from a dense monitoring survey, and; (4) a combination of a land-use and Bayesian maximum entropy model. We used a variety of indices of agreement to compare estimates of exposure assigned from the different methods, notably scatterplots of pairwise predictions, distribution of differences and computation of the absolute agreement intraclass correlation (ICC). For each pairwise prediction, we also produced maps of the ICCs by these regions indicating the spatial variability in the degree of agreement.

RESULTS

We found some substantial differences in agreement across pairs of methods in daily mean predicted concentrations of O₃ and NO₂. On a given day and postal code area the difference in the concentration assigned could be as high as 131ppb for O₃ and 108ppb for NO₂. For both pollutants, better agreement was found between predictions from the nearest monitor and the inverse-distance weighting interpolation methods, with ICCs of 0.89 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.89, 0.89) for O₃ and 0.81 (95%CI: 0.80, 0.81) for NO₂, respectively. For this pair of methods the maximum difference on a given day and postal code area was 36ppb for O₃ and 74ppb for NO₂. The back-extrapolation method showed a higher degree of disagreement with the nearest monitor approach, inverse-distance weighting interpolation, and the Bayesian maximum entropy model, which were strongly constrained by the sparse monitoring network. The maps showed that the patterns of agreement differed across the postal code areas and the variability depended on the pair of methods compared and the pollutants. For O₃, but not NO₂, postal areas showing greater disagreement were mostly located near the city centre and along highways, especially in maps involving the back-extrapolation method.

CONCLUSIONS

In view of the substantial differences in daily concentrations of O₃ and NO₂ predicted by the different methods, we suggest that analyses of the health effects from air pollution should make use of multiple exposure assessment methods. Although we cannot make any recommendations as to which is the most valid method, models that make use of higher spatially resolved data, such as from dense exposure surveys or from high spatial resolution satellite data, likely provide the most valid estimates.

Investigating the Use Of Portable Air Pollution Sensors to Capture the Spatial Variability Of Traffic-Related Air Pollution

Advances in microsensor technologies for air pollution monitoring encourage a growing use of portable sensors. This study aims at testing their performance in the development of exposure surfaces for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and ozone (O3). In Montreal, Canada, a data-collection campaign was conducted across three seasons in 2014 for 76 sites spanning the range of land uses and built environments of the city; each site was visited from 6 to 12 times, for 20 min, using NO2 and O3 sensors manufactured by Aeroqual. Land-use regression models were developed, achieving R(2) values of 0.86 for NO2 and 0.92 for O3 when adjusted for regional meteorology to control for the fact that all of the locations were not monitored at the same time. A total of two exposure surfaces were then developed for NO2 and O3 as averages over spring, summer, and fall. Validation against the fixed-station data and previous campaigns suggests that Aeroqual sensors tend to overestimate the highest NO2 and O3 concentrations, thus increasing the range of values across the city. However, the sensors suggest a good performance with respect to capturing the spatial variability in NO2 and O3 and are very convenient to use, having great potential for capturing temporal variability.

Investigating the Use Of Portable Air Pollution Sensors to Capture the Spatial Variability Of Traffic-Related Air Pollution

Advances in microsensor technologies for air pollution monitoring encourage a growing use of portable sensors. This study aims at testing their performance in the development of exposure surfaces for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and ozone (O3). In Montreal, Canada, a data-collection campaign was conducted across three seasons in 2014 for 76 sites spanning the range of land uses and built environments of the city; each site was visited from 6 to 12 times, for 20 min, using NO2 and O3 sensors manufactured by Aeroqual. Land-use regression models were developed, achieving R(2) values of 0.86 for NO2 and 0.92 for O3 when adjusted for regional meteorology to control for the fact that all of the locations were not monitored at the same time. A total of two exposure surfaces were then developed for NO2 and O3 as averages over spring, summer, and fall. Validation against the fixed-station data and previous campaigns suggests that Aeroqual sensors tend to overestimate the highest NO2 and O3 concentrations, thus increasing the range of values across the city. However, the sensors suggest a good performance with respect to capturing the spatial variability in NO2 and O3 and are very convenient to use, having great potential for capturing temporal variability.