A next-generation ground-based sensor for tropospheric ozone

Excessive concentrations of ground-level ozone present a public health hazard in polluted environments. The Environmental Protection Agency currently rates air quality problems in several metropolitan areas in the United States as either serious or severe. These cities are required to have plans in place for improving air quality. In general, they also attempt to forecast peak ground-level ozone concentrations at the start of each day during the summer months. Air quality improvement strategies and daily forecasts are based on models in which both the science and the input data are very limited. The models are three-dimensional, but conventional ground-based ozone monitoring networks are only two-dimensional. For this reason, we are developing an unattended ozone lidar to be manufactured in multiple units and deployed at several locations throughout a metropolitan region. The lidars will add the third dimension to the data and enable researchers to fully understand ground level ozone concentrations. In this paper we describe the design considerations for the lidars