EUROVOC 2024: Pan-European Campaign Launched to Investigate Volatile Organic Compound Emissions and Their Impact on Air Quality

The 2nd pan-European intensive measurement period (IMP) on VOCs “EUROVOC: EUROpe-wide intensive campaign on Volatile Organic Compounds”, organized by the TFMM-EMEP/ACTRIS/RI-URBANS, was launched on 1 September 2024.

The campaign aims to gain deeper insights into VOC emissions, including their temporal development and speciation, by deploying high-resolution measurements (such as PTR-MS and GC-FID/MS) at sites near emission sources (e.g., urban, industrial, traffic, harbor, and forest areas) for an extended period of one month. These will be complemented by (twinned) measurements at regional sites. Selected sites (see image below) also undergo manual sampling for detailed speciation to capture emission source fingerprints.

EUROVOC brings together 45 urban and rural sites across Europe (ACTRIS NF, EMEP, GAW, Local Air Quality Monitoring Networks, ACTRIS/ICOS sites, etc.), distributed as shown on the following map, to conduct VOC, NOx, ozone, and other measurements throughout September 2024. At the end of the campaign, the results will be assessed for QA/QC based on CiGas guidelines and analyzed by the scientific community to evaluate chemical transport models and help to understand the factors contributing to the formation of tropospheric ozone.

NILU (Chemical Coordinating Center of EMEP/CCC) is leading the coordination of the campaign, while CiGas at IMT Nord Europe in France is responsible for its scientific implementation.