Ongoing Development of a Multi-User Emission Inventory GIS-Based Tool

This paper presents an update on the current status of an ongoing project to develop a multi-user, Emission Inventory GIS-based tool (EIGIS). The fundamental goal behind the EIGIS is to allow a number of simultaneous users to create high-resolution area and mobile source emission inventories more efficiently. To accomplish this, EIGIS was developed using a bottom-up approach in which it is possible to produce updated or scenario inventories based on changes in science (e.g. emission factors), feature-based activity data (e.g. road traffic volumes, population density), and geography (e.g. changes in the location and/or magnitude of emissions that are based on physical characteristics of geographic features such as roads or land use). The tool can also be used to perform queries, generate reports and prepare model input files from computed emissions inventories. EIGIS underwent a rigorous design phase involving input and feedback from a number of different stakeholder groups. This was followed by the development of an initial prototype capable of defining and calculating emissions at the activity level in the Greater Vancouver Regional District in southern British Columbia. Since that time, a number of components within the tool have been upgraded and added, including a partial revision of the underlying database structure upon which the tool is based. A next generation version of the tool is now in the development and testing phase