High Resolution Environmental Modelling and Evaluation Programme for Croatia

Air pollution has long been known to impact on ecosystems and public health, leading to increased mortality rates. As well as ozone and nitrogen oxides, particulate matter (PM) contributes significantly to urban air pollution. The aerosol properties in ur ban areas are shown to be influenced strongly by local sources like traffic and residential heating, but also regional air pollution and long-range transport contribute significantly to urban PM levels. In order to control air pollution, it is important t o trace its origin and sources. The main purpose of this project is to allow a stable long-term development of Croatia's scientific capacity to support the design of environmental protection strategies, in a framework that can be also helpful for other We st Balkan countries. It is proposed here to develop emission inventories of air pollutants in Croatia, to implement and further develop a mesoscale version of the Eulerian EMEP Unified chemical transport model for use in the region, to use the new model development for the assessment and source allocation of urban air pollution in the city of Zagreb, and finally to test and evaluate the new modeling capability according to international peer review. This project builds on existing Croatian expertise in environmental protection and will allow Croatian experts to produce their own assessments of air quality at national and at urban level, evaluate the national consequences of proposed international environmental control options, analyse the effect of fut ure emission scenarios and identify new instruments for implementation of the air quality standards in Croatia. The research work will be carried within the UNECE Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution and and serve as a pilot project to dev elop the air pollution modelling capacities in the Eastern Mediterranean and West Balkan region. This project will facilitate the integration of Croatia to EUs air quality regulations.