A Study on the Collaborative Virtual Geographic Environment (CVGE) for Simulating Air Polluton in Pearl River Delta (PRD) Region

Principal Investigator: Prof. Lin Hui

Project Ref No:	447807
Start Date:	2007/11/01
End Date:	2009/10/31
Type of Grant:	RGC Competitive Earmarked Research Grant 2007/2008

Recent intensified severe air pollution problem in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region, caused by the fast increasing industrial development, has become the top environmental issue for cities in the region including Hong Kong. Air pollution control is critical for the sustainable development. It is possible to tackle the problem by cooperative measures taken by all stakeholders in the region. As a step forward to help alleviating this problem, we have proposed to develop a computerized platform to support the collaboration among cities in the PRD region for air pollution monitoring and management.

The aim is to develop a collaborative virtual geographic environment (CVGE) platform to study the environmental issue from a geographic viewpoint based on a successful VGE developed from a previous funded project by the research team. Instead of using a database oriented geographic information systems (GIS), the present approach is an integrated internet-based model management platform with geo-database support. This platform provides a geo-collaborative working environment in which dynamic processes such as pollutant dispersion are presented for various research partners to study improving methods. Simulation studies using the CVGE and data from the region will help identifying causes of severe pollution episodes leading to feasible corrective measures.