Using CAPECAB to Process Emission Data in the National Air Emissions Monitoring Study

CAPECAB (Calculation of Air Pollutant Emissions from Confined Animal Buildings) is customized software used in the National Air Emissions Monitoring Study (NAEMS) as an efficient data processing tool that reduces data storage space, provides a user-friendly interface to review and process data, and most importantly, aids in producing quality-assured emission data from livestock and poultry facilities. CAPECAB was originally developed in 2003 and has since been used in data processing for numerous livestock-emission projects. For the NAEMS, CAPECAB underwent significant improvements to allow for multiple methods of data review and data validation/invalidation, as well as faster processing speed overall. CAPECAB stores all data for a site in a binary database, which greatly reduces the storage space compared with traditional methods (i.e. spreadsheet files) and enables the user to view one or multiple variables for time ranges spanning from minutes to over one year without manually opening several files. Other features of CAPECAB, such as the user interface, built-in functions (including statistical and histogram features), data validation/invalidation system, and table generation are also discussed in terms of data storage space, quality control, and ease of use.