A Short-Term Prediction Model of PM_2.5 Concentration Based on Deep Learning and Mode Decomposition Methods

Based on a set of deep learning and mode decomposition methods, a short-term prediction model for PM2.5 concentration for Beijing city is established in this paper. An ensemble empirical mode decomposition (EEMD) algorithm is first used to decompose the original PM2.5 timeseries to several high- to low-frequency intrinsic mode functions (IMFs). Each IMF component is then trained and predicted by a combination of three neural networks: back propagation network (BP), long short-term memory network (LSTM), and a hybrid network of a convolutional neural network (CNN) + LSTM. The results showed that both BP and LSTM are able to fit the low-frequency IMFs very well, and the total prediction errors of the summation of all IMFs are remarkably reduced from 21 g/m3 in the single BP model to 4.8 g/m3 in the EEMD + BP model. Spatial information from 143 stations surrounding Beijing city is extracted by CNN, which is then used to train the CNN+LSTM. It is found that, under extreme weather conditions of PM2.5 3 and PM2.5 > 150 g/m3, the prediction errors of the CNN + LSTM model are improved by ~30% compared to the single LSTM model. However, the prediction of the very high-frequency IMF mode (IMF-1) remains a challenge for all neural networks, which might be due to microphysical turbulences and chaotic processes that cannot be resolved by the above-mentioned neural networks based on variable–variable relationship