Pollutants in the Urban Environment (PUrE) - Main Study

有必要评估城市活动的可持续性，并对城市污染的评估和管理采取更全面的办法。目前的做法很少能很好地整合，而且往往是特定于媒体的。需要新的举措来解决不同环境媒体之间的联系，并更有效地处理由一系列城市活动产生的弥漫污染。纯粹的研究项目将把“城市环境”作为一个综合系统来考虑，并将解决多种形式的污染对环境、经济和健康的影响。PIRE项目的目的是制定一个综合评估框架，以完成三项关键任务：1.绘制与人类活动有关的污染物流动图；2.模拟化学品在环境中的命运和运输；以及3.了解城市污染对人类和生态健康的影响。纯方法可以被设想为一个决策支持框架，它提供了一套有用的模型和工具，链接到各种启用了地理信息系统的数据集，以帮助最终用户(监管机构、行业、研究人员)进行评估，从简单的筛选研究，到不同城市情景的详细建模和城市污染可能影响的预测。这个新框架将提供一种更有效的手段：检查弥漫污染的影响；评估新政策措施的影响；评估产品或过程变化的可持续性；以及了解城市环境中主要污染物的行为。

There is a need to assess the sustainability of urban activities, and for a more holistic approach to the evaluation and management of urban pollution. The current practices are seldom well integrated, and are often media-specific. New initiatives are required to address the linkages between different environmental media, and deal more effectively with diffuse pollution arising from a range of urban activities.The PUrE research project will consider the 'urban environment' as an integrated system, and will address the environmental, economic and health implications of multiple forms of pollution. The aim of the PUrE project is to develop an integrated assessment framework that will fulfil three criticaltasks:1. mapping the flow of pollutants associated with human activities;2. modelling the fate and transport of chemicals in the environment; and3. understanding the impacts of urban pollution on human and ecological health.The PUrE approach can be envisaged as a decision-support framework which provides a useful suite of models and tools, linked to a variety of GIS enabled datasets, to help end-users (regulators, industry, researchers) to conduct assessments, ranging from simple screening studies, to detailed modelling of different urban scenarios and prediction of possible impacts of urban pollution.This new framework would provide a more effective means to: examine the effects of diffuse pollution; assess the implications of new policy measures; evaluate the sustainability of changes to products or processes; and understand the behaviour of key pollutants in the urban environment.