Reduce ozone when and where it matters most

A research team at the Georgia Institute of Technology has developed a new way to help meet air quality standards that might reduce the costs of meeting the new ozone rule. Called APOM (Air Pollution Optimization Model), the method targets high-impact times, reducing health impacts at a lower cost. During low-impact time periods, the operations of power plants do not need to change, minimizing the impact on electricity generation cost. During high-impact times, some generation is either shifted to power plants that will have less effect on ozone concentrations in highly populated regions at that specific time, or generation is reduced using demand management. The key advantages of this approach includes, it can find low-cost ways to improve air quality, it can be applied soon, for existing facilities, and it can allow different kinds of emission sources to work together, using market-based approaches, to reduce ozone levels at least cost. The heart of the APOM approach is to find the lowest cost ways to change operations when it matters most - times when ozone concentrations would be highest.