The agreement provides funding under inflation reduction act to conduct ambient air monitoring of pollutants of greatest concern in communities with environmental and health outcome disparities…

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 6 awarded the Capital Area Council of Governments (Capcog) a $206,540 Project Grant under the "Surveys, Studies, Research, Investigations, Demonstrations, and Special Purpose Activities Relating to the Clean Air Act" (CFDA 66.034) program. The funding will support installing a specialized particulate matter (PM2.5) monitor in the Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown metropolitan area to improve understanding of PM2.5 composition and better target emission reduction actions. Capcog will issue subawards totaling $28,785 to Huston-Tillotson University ($13,673) and St. Edward's University ($15,112) to train faculty and students on operating the monitor and analyzing the data. The project aims to expand community capacity for future air quality monitoring and generate speciated reports from 122 PM2.5 samples to identify high concentration sources in underserved Central Texas communities.

The agreement provides funding under inflation reduction act to conduct ambient air monitoring of pollutants of greatest concern in communities with environmental and health outcome disparities stemming from pollution and the coronavirus disease (covid-19) pandemic.activities:capitol area council of government (capcog) proposes to install one speciated particulate matter (PM2.5) monitor in the austin-round rock-georgetown metropolitan statistical area (MSA) to perform measurements of speciated particulate matter (PM2.5) to improve the understanding of the composition of particulate matter (PM2.5) in the region, better-targeted particulate matter (PM2.5) emission reduction actions, and expanded community capacity for future monitoring. Subrecipient:capitol area council of governments (capcog) will issue subawards to huston-tillotson university (HTU) and ST edward's university (SEU). Each university will have 2 faculty members throughout the project period and one student for summer 2025. The subawards will fund faculty time to participate throughout the grant period as a project partner in addition to training the faculty on the maintenance and operation of the samplers. Additionally, the subawards will fund one student from each university to work on the project in summer 2025 to learn the operation and maintenance of the samplers and to assist in data analyses of the collected data throughout the project period. The subaward amounts includes travel for university faculty and students to visit the monitoring site to receive training on the maintenance and operation of the samplers. Capcog proposes to subaward $13,673 to HT and $15,112.00 to SEU for the project period. The subaward amounts were developed in consultation with SEU and HT faculty and the offices of sponsored programs to ensure accuracy of the cost estimates. The total subaward amount equals $28,785.00. Outcomes:capitol area council of governments (capcog): anticipated deliverables include improvement of understanding the composition of particulate matters (PM2.5) in the region, better targeted particulate matter (PM2.5) emission reduction actions and expanded community capacity for future monitoring. The expected outcomes of this project will be speciated reports from 24-hour particulate matter (PM2.5) samples collected every six (6) days for a two period totaling 122 samples. Additional outputs include reports documenting monitoring operations and analyzing the results. In addition, primary outcome of a speciated particulate matter (PM2.5) monitor will improve the understanding of the concentrations and sources of high particulate matter (PM2.5) concentrations within the region, which the current particulate matter (PM2.5) monitoring network is unable to perform. The intended beneficiaries include citizens of central texas in or near underserved communities specifically in the austin-round rock-georgetown metropolitan statistical area (bastrop, caldwell, hays, travis and williamson county.