A review of evaluation procedures for atmospheric dispersion models

Evaluation of atmospheric dispersion models is vital to justify their use within the air quality component of environmental assessments. The Model Validation Kit, compiled and distributed by Helge Olesen of NERI, is often used for such evaluations. Whilst the Model Validation Kit has a wide range of functionality, its users often limit their evaluation to a few simplistic calculations. Suggestions for improving model evaluation include using alternatives to the 'arcwise maximum concentration' as the 'observation data', stratifying the data into appropriate regimes, using both geometric and arithmetic means and reducing the emphasis placed on quantile-quantile plots.