Using Vehicles’ Rendezvous for In Situ Calibration of Instruments in Fleet Vehicle-Based Air Pollution Mobile Monitoring

This study examines the feasibility of the in situ calibration of instruments for fleet vehicle-based mobile monitoring of ultrafine particles (UFPs) and black carbon (BC) by comparing rendezvous vehicle measurements. Two vehicles with identical makes and models of UFP and BC monitors as well as GPS receivers were sampled within 140 m of each other for 2 h in total during winter in Seattle, Washington. To identify an optimal intervehicle distance for rendezvous calibration, 6 different buffers within 0–140 m for UFP monitors and 5 different buffers within 0–90 m for BC monitors were chosen, and the results of calibration were compared against a reference scenario, which consisted of mobile colocation measurements with both sets of the UFP and BC monitors deployed in one of the vehicles. Results indicate that the optimal distances for rendezvous calibration are 10–80 m for UFP monitors and 0–30 m for BC monitors. In comparison with the mobile colocation calibration, the rendezvous calibration shows a normalized root mean squared deviation of 6–14% and a normalized mean absolute deviation of 4–8% for these monitors. Criteria for applying a rendezvous calibration approach are presented, and an extension of this approach to an instrumented fleet of mobile monitoring vehicles is discussed.