Study of distribution of ambient ozone in the vertical profile

• Main Author: Lam, Kit Man
• Other Authors: Chang Wei-Chung
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Environmental engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/64447
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Ozone (O3) is a gas formed naturally in the atmosphere. If present in the stratosphere, it blocks harmful ultra-violet rays from the sun and absorbs heat to warm the Earth. However, ozone present in the troposphere is harmful to human health. Most of the research conducted focuses on the indoor and outdoor dynamics of ozone, land use regression etc. These research conducted aids in minimizing or highlighting the health impacts of troposphere ozone to humans but there is little research done on investigating the change in ozone concentration along the vertical profile. The main objective of this project is to study the distribution of ozone concentrations along the vertical profile adjacent to building stock in Singapore. Four buildings were chosen to conduct the experiment with different elevations, locations, timings and traffic densities with the aim to draw a correlation between the variables. Portable ozone monitors were used to measure ambient ozone concentrations adjacent to buildings at selected levels. Four to six levels per building were chosen for data collection with the levels equally spaced out according to the height of the building. Data collection was conducted at 4 different timings of the day: Pre-sunrise, Post-sunrise, Afternoon and Night. This is to ensure sufficient data to be collected with varying traffic conditions and meteorological conditions. From the data obtained, it is observed that the ozone concentrations vary with the time of the day. The ozone concentrations at pre-sunrise is the lowest, while slowly increasing and peaks in the afternoon and decreases at night back to the pre-sunrise concentrations. More findings will be explained in details in the report.