ACSM – EPRI

ACSM – EPRI Project is a joint research program between Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) as the main sponsor, Dr. Jason Surratt from UNC Chapel Hill which will mainly responsible on the chemical analysis, and Atmospheric Research and Analysis (ARA) and Tennessee Valey Authority (TVA) which will maintain daily operation of the ambient aerosol monitoring instrument at the sites. The instrument, Aerosol Chemical Speciation Monitor (ACSM), is manufactured by Aerodyne Research Institute (ARI) which is a well-known manufacturing company of aerosol measurement instrument.

The first phase of the project is a instrumentation training at Aerodyne Research, Billerica, Massachusetts, from June 16 – 20, 2011. The five days training covered the whole instrumentation aspects, including hardware and software overview, calibration, and data analysis. The training was conducted as a preparation for field deployment of the ACSM in Southern US.

The second phase of the project is deployment of the ambient aerosol monitor at the Jefferson Street (JST) site at Atlanta Georgia. JST site is a one of SouthEastern Aerosol Research and Characterization Study experiment (SEARCH) “Supersite”, which was established in 1998 from collaboration between Southern Company, EPRI, and ARA. The ACSM shipped from UNC Chapel Hill by mid-July and was fully operated on August 1, 2011.

JST site (July 2011 – December 2012)

The third phase of the project is chemical characterization of atmospheric fine aerosol at Look Rock (LRK) site within the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Tennessee area. LRK site has been operated by TVA since 1999 for ambient air quality monitoring, and is collocated with Interagency Monitoring of Protected Visual Environments (IMPROVE) managed by National Park Service (NPS).   The ACSM was shipped from Atlanta to Knoxville where it was received at TVA warehouse before it was transported to the mountain site on January 2013.

LRK site