Air Quality Management Initiatives for Kuala Lumpur:

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Air Quality Management Initiatives for Kuala
Lumpur
MALAYSIA UNIVERSITY of SCIENCE and TECHNOLOGY

• A study of stakeholder roles, emission sources
  and vulnerable populations

Dr. Scott Kennedy Dr. Moazzem Hossain
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Whats the Problem?

• Growing concern about air quality in Kuala
  Lumpur, particularly related to transport sector
• Transport accounts for 93 of CO, 83 of NOx, and
  36 of particulates (DOE, 2004)
• Vehicle ownership rapidly increasing
• Ambient air quality monitoring not sufficient to
  assess public health impact of air pollution
• Casual observation suggests that pollutant
  concentrations are highest in congested areas
  with disproportionate exposure among lower-income
  groups
• Low-income road-side housing areas
• Busy bus terminals
• Side-walk of heavy traffic intersections

Not included episodic smoke pollution from open
burning and land-clearing.
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Air quality management (AQM) requires coordinated
activity

• Data Collection
• Air quality
• Emissions sources
• Receptor density

• Data Analysis
• Gender income disaggregation
• Source inventory
• Damage assessment

• Data Dissemination
• Easily accessible
• All interested parties

There is insufficient data being collected at
hot-spot locations, almost no published reports
showing analyses of this data, and poor
communication among different agencies that could
benefit from the data and reports.
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Project Purpose and Objectives

• Purpose
• (1) To investigate the problem of high pollutant
  concentrations near road traffic sources and the
  potential for high exposure by vulnerable
  population groups
• (2) To develop a replicable method for
  collecting, synthesizing and disseminating air
  pollution data for hot-spot locations
• (3) To assess the current institutional setup
  for urban AQM in Klang Valley.
• Objectives
• Collect/compile air quality data in selected
  hot-spot locations of Kuala Lumpur
• Determine demographic statistics for exposed
  population
• Perform stakeholder analysis for air quality
  management
• Develop and implement strategy for data
  dissemination and information sharing among
  primary stakeholders.

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Research Plan

• Air quality data collection and processing
• Choose site locations
• Bus terminals, high density road side residential
  area, congested roadway intersection with
  pedestrian traffic
• Primary data collection
• Install analyzers for continuous monitoring of
  PM10, NOx, and CO for a 4-month period.
• Secondary data collection
• Obtain pollution data from Department of
  Environment or other sources (if available)
• Compare with meteorological data to check for
  correlation with
• Mean temperatures
• Rainfall

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Research Plan (contd)

• Vulnerable Population study
• Roadside observation to determine population
  density at different times of day
• Short written or oral questionnaire to record
  respondents
• Gender
• Income
• Occupation
• Age
• Knowledge of air pollution health risk
• Ability to avoid risk
• History of respiratory related illness
• Survey population during different periods of the
  day
• Generate demographic breakdown for different
  periods
• Look for categories that suffer high exposure,
  with little knowledge and/or ability to avoid risk

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Research Plan (contd)

• Stakeholder analysis
• Relevant agencies
• Department of Environment, Ministry of Health,
  Department of Transport, Environmental NGOs,
  Gender-focused NGO, Local government (e.g. Kuala
  Lumpur City Hall), RAPIDKL, ASMA (Air Quality
  Monitoring private co.), Residents
  Associations, Bus companies, Vehicle
  manufacturers
• Through interviews, questionnaires, and
  organization literature, determine for each
  agency
• Knowledge of air pollution concerns
• Activities/regulations/policy to mitigate air
  pollution emissions or exposure
• Obstacles preventing action/implementation
• Access to air quality data and air quality
  experts
• Interaction with other agencies on air pollution
  issues
• Interest in becoming more active

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Research Plan (contd)

• Stakeholder analysis (contd)
• Case study of previous coordination
• Emissions testing for commercial vehicles
• Interview representatives from Department of
  Environment and Road Transport Department to
  discover history of vehicle inspection program
  for commercial vehicles
• Analysis of difficulties for implementing similar
  program for private vehicles in the light of the
  above

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Research Plan (contd)

• Data dissemination and information sharing
• Spatial representation of data
• Utilize GIS to present air pollution and
  demographic data in a spatial format for easy
  comprehension
• Highlight other possible problem areas with
  similar characteristics
• Research group website
• Maintain a website for downloading data and
  reports related to this project
• Solicit input from viewers on air quality
  management issues to guide future research
• Workshops
• Organize workshops among stakeholders to present
  research results and discuss coordinated
  initiatives for improvement
• Report
• Prepare report on CD-ROM and hardcopy for
  dissemination to all agencies involved, and other
  interested parties

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Expected Outcomes

• An organizational map of AQM stakeholders
• Information flow between stakeholders, hierarchy
  of authority, knowledge base, access to
  information and experts, important time lags in
  action, response and communication
• Very useful for designing implementation
  strategies for AQM
• Four-month time series data for criteria
  pollutants at selected hot-spot locations
• Full data-set will be publicly accessible in
  user-friendly format (electronic)
• Diurnal variations
• Vulnerable population groups will be identified
• Including knowledge of risk and ability to avoid
  high exposure
• Gender specific risk will be explored

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Expected Outcomes (contd)

• Methodology for air quality data collection with
  rough exposure assessment disaggregated by
  population group
• Initial determination of severity of air
  pollution at hot-spots
• May motive full exposure assessment study
• Reality-check for AQM policy measures
• Initiate dialogue among stakeholders
• Workshops, seminar at MUST
• Increased awareness among stakeholders
• Through dissemination of report
• Identification of areas for further study
• Micro-scale dispersion modeling
• Exposure assessment
• Effectiveness of public awareness campaigns for
  air pollution health risks

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Timeline
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Research Staff

• Principle Investigators (2)
• Research Associate (1)
• Oversee air quality data collection and surveys
• Data processing and spatial analysis
• Research Assistants (2)
• Conduct surveys, check on field sites, literature
  searching, data processing

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Thank you.