Spatio-Temporal Analysis of Ozone and its Precursors Over Eastern United States *

Jhumoor Biswas


Ozone is a secondary pollutant which is generated by primary pollutants such as nitrogen oxides (No_x) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and has a nonlinear relationship with them. Previous studies have shown that ozone has well defined spatial and temporal scales. The lifetime of precursors is much shorter than ozone. It is important to see how well the model system is able to predict the behavior of precursors on different time scales. The model system used in this study is the RAMS/UAM-V system which was used to simulate the summer of 1995 from June 4^th to August 31. In this study the relationship between ozone and its precursors is also examined on different time scales to see how well the model is able to predict this behavior on a seasonal and episodic basis over the eastern United States and to assess if their behavior is affected by the dynamical processes on different time scales.