Managing Uncertainty: The Tropospheric Ozone Challenge

Although it has been over two decades since Congress passed the Clean Air Act of 1968, ozone in the lower atmosphere remains a serious environmental concern in the United States. Significant scientific progress has been made over the past three decades, yet many important uncertainties remain unresolved. How to manage in a situation characterized by these uncertainties is a major challenge that must be overcome to develop an effective ozone abatement strategy. In this paper, we describe a decision framework for evaluation of alternative ozone abatement strategies. The framework, which embodies two major components - a simulation module and a decision module - incorporates uncertainty in a dynamic decision-making process and enable evaluation of NOx and VOC controls on a systematic basis. We demonstrate the application of the framework through an illustrative analysis to provide insight into the value of flexible ozone abatement strategies in reducing the total cost of achieving air-quality goals and the tradeoffs between the timing and the accuracy of additional information. 40 refs., 6 figs.