Hearing air pollution: sound art from WM-Air

Air pollution concentration data for the West Midlands (UK), modelled with CERC`s ADMS-Urban model, have had new interpretations created by sound artist Robert Jarvis which are now available to experience online. Listeners can watch the variation of air pollution with synchronised audio based on the spatially and temporally varying concentration levels representing either an average daily cycle or an example route across the area. The art aims to stimulate public curiosity about air quality, to improve understanding of how to manage personal exposure to air pollution and to inspire reductions in emissions.

The underlying modelled concentrations come from baseline ADMS-Urban modelling carried out for the WM-Air project, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and led by the University of Birmingham. CERC were involved in emissions processing using the Emissions Inventory Toolkit (EMIT) and assisted with model evaluation, as published and presented at the CERC User Group Meeting in 2021. WM-Air regional modelling of emissions scenarios for particulate concentrations using the CMAQ model has also recently been published.