Source term estimation method using long-range inverse atmospheric transport simulation

A new method to estimate the location and the relative rate of an accidental atmospheric release from the input of environmental monitoring data such as concentration of contaminants has been developed and its performance has been verified using the long-range atmospheric tracer experiment data. This method employs an inverse transport calculation of a mass of marker particles released from monitoring points. The source terms are evaluated from the statistics on the position of marker particles. The objective domain is about 1, 000km or more from a release point. The verification showed that the location and the rate of release were fairly estimated by the method. It was also pointed out that the combination of this method with a normal atmospheric dispersion simulation would be effective.