About Bulgarian Chemical Weather Forecasting System (BgCWFS)
The BgCWFS, developed at NIMH, is designed on the base of US Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) Models-3 air quality modelling system (CMAQ v4.6,
WRF v3.6.1, MCIP v3.6 and SMOKE v2.4). It works operationally from the
beginning of 2012 and provides 3-days forecast products in the form of
hourly air quality maps at surface level for ozone, sulphur dioxide
(SO2), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulate matter
with diameter less than 10 µm (PM10).
(http://info.meteo.bg/cw2.1/ and
http://info.meteo.bg/cw2.2/).
In the frame of SIDUAQ project, a modification of the BgCWFS was made to
assimilate satellite data measured by GOME-2 instrument on board of MetOP
satellites for domain Europe. Satellite retrieved data for Aerosol optical
depth (AOD), NO2, SO2 in BgCWFS-sat are used for
providing hourly values of particulate matter (PM) and other key
pollutants with resolution 9x9 km over the territory of Bulgaria.
About Local Air Quality Management System (LAQMS)
The LAQMS, developed at NIMH, is designed on the base of the local dispersion
model (Pol Tran). It is in use from 2004 and has been upgraded several times.
The system provides diagnostic products in a form of hourly air quality maps
at surface level for SO2, NO2, PM10 and Benzo(a)pyrene.
In the frame of SIDUAQ project, some modifications of the LAQMS were made:
- a new emission inventorization was included, accounting for new emission sources;
- modification of the LAQMS to take its initial and boundary conditions from the BgCWFS output.
The space resolution of the LAQMS is 1x1 km for the region and 250x250m
for the city of Plovdiv.
When coupled to BgCWFS-sat, the LAQMS implicitly benefits from atmospheric
composition satellite data.