ALPACA sites:

The two maps below show the locations of sites used in this study. The first map is a broad overview of the Fairbanks bowl, which has hills to the North, West, and East of Fairbanks. The residential community of North Pole lies to the East of Fairbanks on a fairly flat plain.

There are four main sites being used in ALPACA

1) Downtown-CTC — This site studies air quality in the urban core of Fairbanks to better understand the mix of pollution present downtown and chemical processes that convert gases such as sulfur dioxide to particulate matter under cold and dark conditions.

2) House — This site is in the Hamilton Acres area near downtown Fairbanks. Here, we will study indoor air inside to house to better understand what people are breathing most of the time and how it relates to the outside air quality. We will also compare the mix of pollution at this more residential area to the urban air sampled downtown.

3) Soccer Fields — This site is at a large open soccer field complex that provides a large snow-covered region to allow us to study interactions between snow and the atmosphere. Vertical profiling above the field will probe the vertical extent of the pollution.

4) North Pole (see FNSB overview map) — This site is on the outskirts of North Pole at a location far from air traffic so we can measure the vertical extent of the pollution to higher altitudes than would be safe in Fairbanks. We can also probe pollution outflow from the small city of North Pole and surrounding residential areas.

A number of other sites will be used

5) Profiler (DOAS) — We will locate an optical profiler downtown that will view the atmosphere above the house site. Reflector mirrors on Birch Hill at various altitudes will return the light to the profiler, where the light is analyzed for light-absorbing gases such as nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide.

6) Birch Hill — We will measure air at the top of Birch Hill, which is typically high enough to be less impacted by Fairbanks pollution, to determine background air above the temperature inversion.

The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC) routinely monitors pollution at three sites in this study area

7) NCORE — This downtown site has an extensive set of measurements of particles and gases. Data are available realtime at this link.

8) A-Street (see FNSB overview map) — This neighborhood site is near the house in the Hamilton Acres neighborhood. Data are available realtime at this link.

9) Hurst Road — This residential site is in the North Pole area. Data are available realtime at this link.