Event-triggered passive sampling for cost-effective regulatory monitoring

除了对环境有害的污染物，人类和其他动物从各种来源，特别是从农业和工业过程进入大气和河流。污染物的释放可能是直接的、高浓度的“急性”事故，而且通常来自容易找到的“点”源(例如，意外的化学品泄漏)。它也可能来自长期有效的“慢性”事件，以及难以准确定位且影响距离相当远的“扩散”来源(例如，使用农业化肥和杀虫剂产生的污染，最终可能到达并影响水生生态系统)。政府监管机构，如英国环境局，根据法律安全标准或良好做法守则，监测和评估水体中的污染水平。定期监测需要测量，如果全天候进行，获取和产生用于分析的大量数据将是昂贵和耗时的。如果采样器能够被设计成对与超过监管水平的高污染风险相关的关键环境触发因素作出反应而开启，则监测的效力和效率可以得到提高。我们的项目将为特定污染物设计环境触发采样器，并在暴雨引发的水流变化以及风向和风速变化的条件下进行测试。

Pollutants harmful to the environment, humans and other animals enter the atmosphere and rivers from a variety of sources and particularly from agricultural and industrial processes. Pollutant release may be from 'acute' incidents which are immediate, of high concentration and usually from easily located 'point' sources (e.g. accidental chemical spillage). It may also be from 'chronic' incidents, effective over a longer term and from 'diffuse' sources which are difficult to pinpoint and with impacts at considerable distances (e.g. pollution arising from the application of agricultural fertilizers and pesticides which may eventually reach and affect aquatic ecosystems). Government regulatory bodies, such as the UK Environment Agency, monitor and assess pollution levels in waterbodies in relation to legal safety standards or codes of good practice. Regular monitoring requires measurements which, if conducted on a 24/7 basis, are expensive and time consuming to obtain and yield enormous data loads for analysis. The effectiveness and efficiency of monitoring could be improved if samplers could be designed to switch on in response to key environmental triggers which are associated with high risk of pollution exceeding regulatory levels. Our project will design environment-triggered samplers for specific pollutants and test them under conditions of changes in water flow caused by the triggers of heavy rainfall and changes in wind direction and speed.