Application of satellite remote sensing data and random forest approach to estimate ground-level PM concentration in Northern region of Thailand.

Numerous epidemiological studies have shown that particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter up to 2.5 μm (PM) is associated with many health consequences, where PM concentration obtained from the monitoring station was normally applied as the exposure level, so that the concentration of PM in unmonitored areas has not been captured. The satellite-derived aerosol optical depth (AOD) product is then used to spatially predict ground truth of PM concentration that covers the locations with no air quality monitoring station, but this method has seldom been developed in Thailand. This study aimed at estimating ground-level PM concentration at 3 km × 3 km spatial resolution over Northern region of Thailand in 2021 using the random forest model integrating the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) AOD products from Terra and Aqua satellites, meteorological factors, and land use data. A random forest model contained 100 decision trees was utilized to train the model, and 10-fold cross-validation approach was implemented to validate the model performance. The good consistency between actual (observed) and predicted concentrations of PM in Northern region of Thailand was observed, where a coefficient of determination (R) and root mean square error (RMSE) of the model fitting were 0.803 and 14.30 μg/m, respectively, and those of 10-fold cross-validation approach were 0.796 and 14.64 μg/m, respectively. The three most important predictors for estimating the ground-level concentrations of PM in this study were normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), relative humidity, and number of fire hotspot, respectively. Findings from this study revealed that integrating the MODIS AOD, meteorological variables, and land use data into the random forest model precisely and accurately estimated ground-level PM concentration over Northern region of Thailand that can be further used to investigate the effects of PM exposure on health consequences, even in unmonitored locations, in epidemiological studies.