Space-time estimation of grid-cell hourly ozone levels for assessment of a deterministic model

We present an approach to estimate hourly grid-cell surface ozone concentrations based on observations from point monitoring sites in space, for comparison with grid-based results from the SARMAP photochemical air-quality model for a region of northern California. Statistical estimation is carried out on a transformed (square root) scale, followed by back-transforming to the original scale of ozone in parts per billion, adjusting for bias and variance. We estimate a spatially-varying diurnal mean structure and a non-separable space-time correlation structure on the transformed scale. Temporal pre-whitening is followed by modelling of a spatially non-stationary, diurnally-varying spatial correlation structure using a spatial deformation approach. Comparisons of SARMAP model results with the estimated grid-cell ozone levels are presented.