Current Projects
Integrated air quality sensor for energy efficient environment control (INTASENSE)
FP7 funded 2011-2014
The INTASENSE concept is to integrate a number of micro- and nano-sensing technologies onto a common detection platform to produce a low-cost miniaturised system that can comprehensively measure air quality, and identify the nature and form of pollutants.
Dr Hannah Newton (LEC) advises the industrial partners about the development and design specifications for the INTASENSE sensor, the validation of the sensor against laboratory techniques, and the latest regulations concerning the project's target pollutants.
Assessing the Performance of Air-Pollution Sources From Ambient Data (Airtrack)
NERC funded, 2009 – 2012
CLAIRE-UK: Fluxes of traces gases and particles above the Amazonian rain forest NE/1012567/1
Professor Nick Hewitt
Value to Lancaster, £566,000
Biogenic trace gases influence tropospheric gas phase chemistry and may be precursors to particle formation and mass. They therefore have effects both on air quality and on the radiation balance (and hence climate system) of the Earth. With NERC support we are part of a large international project – called the Cooperative LBA Atmospheric Regional Experiment CLAIRE project (part of the on-going Large-Scale Biosphere/Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia). Within the framework of this project we wish to measure trace gas fluxes from the forest canopy and use the data to better understand the effects of volatile organic compounds emitted from the forest on atmospheric composition and chemistry. This project is a collaboration with Dr Ben Langford and Dr Eiko Nemitz at CEH Edinburgh and with Prof Rob MacKenzie at the University of Birmingham.
Urban Futures - Sustainable Regeneration: from evidence based urban futures to implementation (a constituent part of the EPSRC SUE-II programme
Prof CN Hewitt, Dr AR MacKenzie, Dr D Whyatt and Prof R Cooper (LICA)
EPSRC, £524,592, 2008 – 2012
In this project we use atmospheric chemistry and transport modelling to assess the impact of urban design on urban air quality. The principal models used are the WRF-CHEM mesoscale model and the ADMS dispersion model.
Aerosol coupling in the Earth system (ACES) (a constituent part of the NERC APPRAISE programme)
Dr AR MacKenzie and Prof CN Hewitt (PDRA: Dr A Ryan)
NERC, £355,526, 2007 – 2010
Oxidant and particle photochemical processes above a South-East Asian tropical rain forest (OP3-Danum-08)
Prof CN Hewitt, Dr A.R. MacKenzie, Dr B Davison and Dr N.A. Chappell (PDRA: Dr B Langford)
NERC, £521,279, 2007 – 2010
OP3 is a large NERC consortium project lead by Nick Hewitt at Lancaster. Fluxes and concentrations of trace gases and particles were made from and above the rain forest canopy at the Bukit Atur Global Atmosphere Watch station and at the nearby Sabahmas oil palm plantation, in Sabah, Malaysia in 2008, using both ground-based and airborne measurements. Composition measurements show that the rainforest site was not impacted by significant sources of anthropogenic pollution, and this was confirmed by satellite retrievals of NO2 and HCHO. The dominant modulators of atmospheric chemistry at the rain forest site were therefore emissions of BVOCs and soil emissions of reactive nitrogen oxides. At the observed BVOC:NOx volume mixing ratio (~ 104 pptv/pptv), current chemical models suggest that daytime maximum OH concentrations should be ca. 105 radicals cm-3, but observed OH concentrations were an order of magnitude greater than this. We confirm, therefore, previous measurements which suggest that an unexplained source of OH must exist above tropical forests and continue to interrogate the data to find explanations for this.
Modelling of atmospheric oxidants and aerosols: deposition, emission and chemical transformation (QUAAC) (a constituent part of the NERC QUEST programme)
Prof CN Hewitt (with Prof D Beerling, University of Sheffield) (PDRA: Dr D Wilton)
NERC, £118,070, 2006 – 2010