DISCOVER-AQ: Porterville Ground Site Air Quality Measurements

NASA's DISCOVER-AQ campaign collected ground-based data at the Porterville site during the 2013 California deployment. The four-year study employed two aircraft and surface monitoring sites to validate satellite observations of near-surface pollution. Data collection is complete for this deployment.

Use Cases

• Validate satellite-derived air quality estimates based on ground-level measurements.
• Analyze aerosol properties and trace gas species based on in-situ spiral profiling.
• Model near-surface pollution conditions based on meteorological variables.
• Assess compliance with National Ambient Air Quality Standards based on targeted regional data.

Strengths

• Data collection is complete for the California deployment.
• Part of a four-year NASA campaign involving multiple research centers and universities.
• Integrates data from aircraft, ground sites, and existing monitoring networks.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is specific to the 2013 California deployment and four other regional campaigns.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Data collected via targeted airborne and ground-based observations during the DISCOVER-AQ field study.

Time Range

2013

Geography

San Joaquin Valley, California, USA