Why a “composite mapping” initiative

Over the last years WG1 and WG2 have focused their activity on QA/QC methodologies and benchmarking processes for emission inventories and air quality assessment. An important point in QA/QC (both for emissions and concentrations) is to look at the spatial “dimension” of these variables, which is not always properly taken into account.

This is the reason why FAIRMODE set up a “composite mapping” exercise for both emissions and concentrations. The exercise is supported by a “composite mapping” tool which is a mosaic of the best available national, regional or local estimate for different EU areas, and allows for qualitative and quantitative (spatial) comparison of emission and concentration maps.

The objective of this exercise is in the first place capacity building, but also triggering discussions on topics such as:

• border effects which will become more visible between neighboring regions/countries,
• quality and consistency of emission inventories and concentration maps,
• use of data assimilation or data fusion techniques to produce air quality maps,
• use of spatial proxies to allocate air pollutant emissions,
• choice of adequate spatial resolution for a particular application.

The platform enables the comparison of emission inventories and concentration mapping methodologies, making it easier to learn from each other. Furthermore, the comparison exercise can boost the participation of countries and regions that are not participating nowadays.

How does it work

For registered users only, composite maps of emissions and air quality over Europe are open for discussion. The maps can be explored through the ECMap Viewer. Interested members of FAIRMODE which are not yet registered can join the initiative by filling out the official application form.

How to contribute

All FAIRMODE participants are encouraged to participate in the exercise.

For the concentration maps, data is requested as:

• annual mean concentration values (ground level layer),
• for NO₂ and PM₁₀,
• in µg/m³,
• preferably for the year 2012 and 2015 (other years can be uploaded as well).

For the emission maps, data is requested as:

• annual total values,
• in ton of pollutant / km² · year,
• one map per pollutant (preferably for NO_x, NMVOC, PM₁₀, PM_2.5),
• one map per pollutant sector (preferably for road transport and residential/commercial combustion sectors),
• preferably for 2015.

All maps (emissions and concentrations) have to be provided as gridded data in one of the following two data formats:

• ASCII (ESRI ASCII Raster format specification)
• GeoTiff (GeoTiff specification)

Three simple steps to contribute

1. Use the “quality control tool” to check your data. The ECMap-QC tool should be used to check the format and consistency of your emission and concentration maps before uploading your data to the ECMap Database. It is really essential that you perform this quality check yourself to make sure that your data set is interpreted in the correct way (projection system, resolution, units...). The ECMap-QC tool can be freely downloaded. QC checks have to be performed off-line on your own computer system. After download, the tool is installed by double clicking on the CMapping.exe file. User manuals for both emissions and concentrations describing the QC process and tool are available for downloading. The two user guides are also available in the help folder located in the installation directory of the ECMap-QC.
2. Upload the data to the system. Registered members of FAIRMODE can upload their data through a reserved area in the ECMap Database. During the upload process you will be asked to provide some meta information of your data set. Please read the available ECMap Database user guide to perform this step.
3. Visualising the results. Once you have uploaded your data they will be processed and added to the ECMap Viewer. You can visualize the results in terms of emissions and concentrations

Disclaimer

The data sets included in the EU Composite Mapping Exercise remain the exclusive property of the national, regional or local data providers. All information provided via the EU Composite Map Platform can only be used in the context of FAIRMODE.