Classification of weather patterns to study the influence of meteorological characteristics on PM2.5 concentrations in Yunlin County, Taiwan

Abstract Yunlin County is located in the central part of western Taiwan with major emissions from the Mailiao industrial park, the Taichung Power Plants and heavy traffic. In order to understand the influence of meteorological conditions on PM 2.5 concentrations in Yunlin County, we applied a two-stage cluster analysis method using the daily averaged surface winds from four air quality monitoring stations in Yunlin County to classify the weather pattern. The study period includes 1095 days from Jan 2013 to December 2015. The classification results show that the low PM 2.5 concentration occurs when the synoptic weather in Taiwan is affected by the strong southwesterly monsoonal flow. The high PM 2.5 concentration occurs when Taiwan is under the influence of weak synoptic weather conditions and continental high-pressure peripheral circulation. A high PM 2.5 event was studied and the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) meteorological model was performed. The result indicated that due to being blocked by the Central Mountain Range, Yunlin County, which is situated on the leeside of the mountains, exhibits low wind speed and strong subsidence behavior that favors PM 2.5 accumulation.

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