Ozone in Lombardy: Years 1998-1999

Photochemical pollutants, especially ozone, have reached very high levels in Lombardy in recent years, with peaks of up to 150 ppb in late spring and summer. Lombardy, lying on the Po Plain, supports a large number of cities and industries and these, along with heavy traffic, produce copious amounts of primary pollutants such as nitrogen oxides and numerous volatile organic compounds. Furthermore, the peculiar orography of this region fosters the stagnation of air masses on a basin-scale and the presence of diurnal breezes towards northern areas, along with the evolution of the Mixing Layer, spread the polluted air masses over a large territory. Numerous stations in Lombardy give the concentrations of ozone and of nitrogen oxides. In this paper, ozone measurements carried out at the plain area around Milan and at pre-alpine sites in the spring and summer 1998 and 1999 will be shown and discussed, focusing on the months of May and July. The study of temporal and spatial behaviour of ozone goes hand in hand with the analysis of the Boundary Layer's evolution. A number of radon stations were operating in Milan and in other sites in Lombardy. Measurements of atmospheric concentrations of radon yield an index of atmospheric stability, of the formation of thermal inversion, of convective turbulence, and of the movement of air masses, and hence they are very relevant to the understanding of the conditions of atmospheric pollutants.