Imagine you are sitting at your computer poring over data from an air quality monitoring station that continuously measures levels of air pollutants at the edge of your city's industrial park. This data has been flagged by one of your team's technicians and passed on to you for review. Over the past few days, this station has been reporting abnormally high levels of pollutants that could become a threat to nearby residential neighbourhoods. As an air quality specialist, you review this data and other contributing factors to determine why the levels of air pollution have jumped and what needs to be done to safeguard the health of nearby residents and workers in the industrial park. You will spend the next few days investigating the recent increase in air pollution in that area of the city.

First, you examine the data to determine exactly which pollutants are present at high quantities in the air. This information will help determine the source: it may be that one of the manufacturing plants in the industrial park has released an illegal amount of pollutants into the air. You will also look at local geographic data to help pinpoint the emission source. Once a source has been found, you will review meteorological data from the area, particularly weather patterns over the last few days. Different pressure zones, wind speeds, and wind directions all contribute to changes in ambient air quality. You will also look at meteorological forecasts to determine if local weather might cause the situation to worsen or if winds might blow more pollution into residential zones. All these factors become pieces to a puzzle that you must put together in order to determine what is causing the reported rise in pollution and what needs to be done to keep people in the area safe.