Emissions and air quality measurements

SMARTEMIS

The Swiss Mobile Aircraft Emissions Measurement System (SMARTEMIS) is a state-of-the-art sampling and measurement system for gaseous pollutants and particulate matter in accordance with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) standards and recommended practices. It is one of three reference measurement systems worldwide for non-volatile particulate matter emissions from aircraft turbine engines.

SMARTEMIS Instruments

	Instrument List	Function/Species measured
Particle Measurement
Present Instruments	AVL Micro Soot Sensor (MSS)	nvPM mass (black carbon) concentration
	AVL Particle Counter Advanced Plus (APC)	nvPM number concentration
	TSI Scanning Mobility Particle Sizer Model 3938 (long and nano DMA)	Particle number size distribution
	Chell CSM2000 + Photovolt 577PC ( SAE ARP 1179 compliant smoke meter and reflectometer)	ICAO Smoke Number
	Catalytic Instruments Catalytic Stripper CS08	removal of volatile PM fraction
	Aerodyne CAPS PMssa Monitor (660 nm)	aerosol scattering, extinction, and single scattering albedo (SSA)
Possible extensions	Filter sampling system for thermal-optical analysis

	* nvPM = non-volatile particulate matter; DMA = Differential mobility analyzer
Gas phase measurement
Present instruments	Horiba PG350 multigas analyzer	O₂ ,CO, CO₂, NO_x, SO₂
	Ecophysics CLD 844 S hr NOx analyzer	NO, NO₂, NO_x
	Horiba MEXA 1170HFID Hydrocarbon (HC) analyzer	Total HC
	Thermo Scientific 48iQ CO analyzer	CO
	Thermo Scientific 410i and 410 iQ CO₂ analyzers	CO₂
	Thermo Scientific 43i SO2 analyzer	SO₂
	Thermo Scientific 146iQ Multigas calibrator	calibration gas dilution for span and multipoint calibrations
Possible extensions	Custom-built VOC sampling system for thermal desorption GC-MS analysis

Handheld aerosol instruments

Instrument	Data reported
Naneos Partector 2	lung deposited surface area (LDSA), estimated average particle size, number and mass concentrations
Palas Fidas Frog	Particle number size distribution (0.18 – 10 microns), particle mass and number concentrations
AethLabs microAeth MA300	5 wavelength absorption analysis by measuring the rate of change of transmitted light due to continuous particle deposition on filter at 880 nm (black carbon), 625 nm, 528 nm, 470 nm, 375 nm (UV PM)

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Meteorology

Application includes:

Measurement of wind speed and direction around airports to assist pilots and air traffic controllers in understanding the influence of terrain on take off and landing

LIDAR measuring wind parameters over the runway of Hausen am Albis airfield. This allows to draw conclusions about wind and its influence on departing and arriving small aircraft.

Measurement of downwash and wake vorticies of different aircraft
Wind measurements in complex alpine topography for studies of influence from turbulence on air traffic
Wind measurements for wind energy potential studies
Validation measurements for studies using the PALM model

You can find more information on the LIDAR here.

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Computing tools

Speedflyer Cluster

The ZAV currently maintains four computing nodes to perform state-of-the-art high performance computing jobs. . Our first two-node cluster, the Speedflyer, features two Intel Xeon Platinum 8164 processors per node, totaling in 104 usable CPU cores. The Speedflyer cluster in its initial form proved a great tool to perform modelling tasks, but more computing power was required to satisfy all in-house computing needs. Therefore, we scaled up our available computing power by adding two new nodes to our arsenal, that each feature two AMD Epyc 7742 per Node, totaling in an additional 256 available cores. With this setup, we can perform demanding numerical simulations in atmospheric sciences, urban climate research and collision risk modeling domains.

With our setup, we have enough computing power to serve all our needs and can rent out capacity as well.

If you are interested, feel free to contact us.

Parameters	Specifications
Make and model	Lenovo SR650
CPU	2 x Intel Xeon Platinum 8164 processor (2,0 GHz, 26 cores, 150 W)
RAM	24 x ThinkSystem 32 GB TruDDR4, 2666 MHz (2Rx4, 1,2 V) RDIMM
Storage	10x ThinkSystem SAS-512e Hot-Swap-capable 3.5″ 10TB HDD
RAID-Controller	Thinksystems RAID 930-16i

Speedflyer: Weisshorn and Schwarzhorn

Parameters	Specifications
Make and model	Lenovo ThinkSystem SR665
CPU	2x AMD EPYC 7742 64-Core Processor per Node
RAM	16x 32GB Samsung 3200MHz DIMM DDR4 RAM per Node
Storage	48TB
Raid -Controller	Lenovo RAID 940-8i

We have successfully run several numerical simulation models on our clusters, among which are (not conclusive):

and more!

PALM Model System (Parallelized Large Eddy Simulation Model)

The PALM Model system is a modern high resolution computational fluid dynamics model, mainly used for simulating urban microclimate, planetary boundary layer flows and wind flows in complex terrain. We have applied this model for simulating urban climate and various wind flow scenarios, including flows in complex Swiss alpine terrain, an application of importance to the Swiss aviation and energy industry. With our cluster setup, we can achieve high resolution PALM simulation runs in a reasonable time frame.