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. 2022 May 29;39(10):1709–1720. doi: 10.1007/s00376-022-1346-5

The Impact of the Numbers of Monitoring Stations on the National and Regional Air Quality Assessment in China During 2013–18

Hongyan Luo 1,2, Xiao Tang 1,3,✉, Huangjian Wu 1, Lei Kong 1, Qian Wu 1, Kai Cao 1, Yating Song 1,2, Xuechun Luo 1, Yao Wang 1, Jiang Zhu 1,2, Zifa Wang 1,2,3
PMCID: PMC9148413  PMID: 35669259

Abstract

China national air quality monitoring network has become the core data source for air quality assessment and management in China. However, during network construction, the significant change in numbers of monitoring sites with time is easily ignored, which brings uncertainty to air quality assessments. This study aims to analyze the impact of change in numbers of stations on national and regional air quality assessments in China during 2013–18. The results indicate that the change in numbers of stations has different impacts on fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and ozone concentration assessments. The increasing number of sites makes the estimated national and regional PM2.5 concentration slightly lower by 0.6–2.2 µg m−3 and 1.4–6.0 µg m−3 respectively from 2013 to 2018. The main reason is that over time, the monitoring network expands from the urban centers to the suburban areas with low population densities and pollutant emissions. For ozone, the increasing number of stations affects the long-term trends of the estimated concentration, especially the national trends, which changed from a slight upward trend to a downward trend in 2014–15. Besides, the impact of the increasing number of sites on ozone assessment exhibits a seasonal difference at the 0.05 significance level in that the added sites make the estimated concentration higher in winter and lower in summer. These results suggest that the change in numbers of monitoring sites is an important uncertainty factor in national and regional air quality assessments, that needs to be considered in long-term concentration assessment, trend analysis, and trend driving force analysis.

Key words: monitoring network, newly added sites, PM2.5, ozone

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the use of surface air quality observation data from CNEMC. This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation (Grant Nos. 41875164 & 92044303) and the National Key Research and Development Plan (Grant No. YS2020YFA060022).

Footnotes

Article Highlights

• The impact of the numbers of monitoring stations on air quality assessment in China during 2013–18 is investigated.

• The newly added sites make the estimated national and most regional PM2.5 concentrations slightly lower.

• The newly added sites affect the estimated long-term trends of ozone concentrations.

• The impact of the increasing number of sites on ozone assessment exhibits a seasonal difference.

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