Evaluating the impacts of technology and policy on long-range transport of toxic pollutants

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Toxic pollutants, such as mercury and persistent organics, are a global environmental concern. They are persistent and can disperse at regional and global scales (particularly through the atmosphere), bioaccumulating in food webs and leading to potential risks for humans and wildlife. As a result, the releases and uses of these hazardous substances are targeted by policy, including global environmental treaties. This coordinated global action is particularly important for countries like Canada, where the majority of what is deposited to the surface (that is of human origin) comes from out-of-country sources. Further, Canadian ecosystems such as the Arctic, and the communities (often Indigenous) that depend on the fisheries and wildlife therein, may be particularly vulnerable to the impacts of these pollutants. Evaluating whether these global policy efforts will be sufficient to protect the health of these vulnerable populations therefore requires that links between human activity, emissions, transport, and environmental loadings be better understood. The long-term objective of my research program is to understand how human activities at local-to-regional scales affect global chemical pollution, and then how in turn, this global environmental change affects specific vulnerable ecosystems. Through understanding these dynamics, my goal is to develop and apply methods and tools that can support the design and evaluation of policy. My short-term objectives are to understand how technology and policy changes may affect the long-range atmospheric transport (LRAT) of two pollutants of concernmercury and polychlorinated biphenylsto vulnerable ecosystems like the Arctic. With a team of students, over the next 5 years I will develop global emissions inventories under technology and policy scenarios, focusing on emissions sources with high uncertainty. I will investigate how these scenarios impact LRAT of these pollutants through a case study of the Arctic using atmospheric modelling. Finally, I will develop a decision support tool that can support rapid and interactive atmospheric modelling, including analysis of uncertainty, by researchers and stakeholders. A better understanding of the links between human activity and LRAT of chemical pollutants can help us evaluate whether policies currently being implemented might be effective at reducing global pollution burdens, and whether additional policies are needed to address remaining sources of concern. In addition, this research program will train highly qualified personnel in air quality engineering techniques and answering critical questions at the interface of engineering, policy, and atmospheric science. It will also lay the groundwork for future research, in our group and others, on the connections between local environments and global change, and impacts of policy on human health and the economy in Canada.