Regional model of a Sogamoso Valley as a complement to the AERMOD model for the operation

摘要

Sogamoso Valley is an area in Colombia with a high industrial activity, and a great impact on the economy of the country. Several sources contribute to the air quality level, especially for particulate material. On the framework of the environmental impact assessment for the Belencito mine, high air pollution levels were measured throughout the year, exceeding these measurements the air quality annual standard por PM10 (50μg/m~3) during some months. Although mining is an important atmospheric pollutant source, there are a number of high-impact sources which contribute to the local air quality levels such as unpaved roads, uncontroled fugitive sources like furnaces for the production of lime and bricks and other industries. To effectively separate the actual contribution of the mining operation under study, taking into account that there is already a high background concentration, the modeling was carried out for three scenarios of mine contributions in year 5, year 8 and year 12. In conjunction with the AERMOD model obtained for the mining operation, spatial analysis GIS tools were used using the ArcGis 10.1 software. Initially it generates a spatial model with background concentrations in the sensitive receptors (BKG), then a spatial model with the values of the ratio (RT Cal), then a Raster operation is generated between the obtained model AERMOD (ModPM10) and the background models BKG) and the ratios (RT Cal). It is concluded with this work that the operation of the Belencito Mine, located at the municipality of Sogamoso, Colombia, is not currently the contributor to the PM10 concentration, and it is not going to be during its future operation, always remaining the PM10 concentrations below the annual national standard at the discrete receptors located at the Sogamoso Valley.