A basin-wide air quality trend analysis for the South Coast Air Basin of California is conducted for hydrocarbons (HC), NOx, O3 and CO using multi-station composite daily maximum-hour average ambient concentrations for the third quarter (July, August and September) from 1968 to 1985. Emissions and air quality trends are compared for the period 1968-1984. Ambient HC and NOX trends are somewhat different from estimated emission trends of HC and NOx, while a definite, downward trend of ambient CO is consistent with vehicular emission control measures. Basin-wide ambient HC, NOx and O3 appear to show downward trends for the period 1970-1985, but because of high fluctuations it is difficult to delineate trends for shorter periods. The meteorology (850 mb temperature)-adjusted O3 shows a more consistent downward trend than does unadjusted O3. Polynomial and multiplicative regression models for basin-wide empirical O3-HC-NOx relationships Indicate that the O3 variation is explained largely by the meteorological variable (850 mb temperature) although model estimations are improved by adding HC and NOx concentration terms.
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Kuntasal et al. (1987) studied this question.