Modelling uncertainty of vehicular emissions inventory: A case study of Ireland

The vehicular emission modelling software COPERT is extensively used in generating emission levels for National Emissions Inventory in Europe and in some other countries internationally. This paper aims to study the uncertainties associated with emission estimates generated from COPERT(v5.1) outputs through sensitivity analysis of the model input parameters. The input parameters considered in this study are temperature, speed, relative humidity, trip length, and driving style (mileage share). Many of these parameters are not directly measured or country-wide average values are investigated in this study. The uncertainties of the emission estimates were obtained through varying the parameter values, within realistic limits, either individually or considering factor interactions by varying two or more parameters simultaneously. The uncertainties of the emission estimates of certain pollutants (CO, VOC and NMVOC) can be significant from -58% to +76%. Some gases, such as CO2 show almost no sensitivity to input parameter variations. The results indicate that the COPERT outputs are most sensitive to variations in trip length and speed, both of which are not directly measured. Considering the percentage of urban driving share has a huge effect on the national emission estimates, inventories were separately prepared for the Greater Dublin Area (GDA), the largest urban area of Ireland with highest population and vehicle densities. GDA has 48% and 50.37% shares of CO2 and NOx emissions respectively, compared to the national levels. The consequence of over- or underestimation of emission inventories for Ireland was calculated to be approximately +/- is an element of 45million. Considering the major implications of NEI for climate change and other related impacts it is crucial to report the pollutant emission levels appropriately stating uncertainty levels. The findings of this study provide national experts with a methodology to estimate uncertainties of COPERT outputs and to identify the key sources of these uncertainties where policy and emission reduction strategies should be targeted. (C) 2018 Published by Elsevier Ltd.