Red Hook is a vibrant residential and commercial neighborhood of Brooklyn; however, the low-lying area is highly susceptible to floods, and in 2012 the neighborhood experienced unprecedented damage from Hurricane Sandy’s storm surge. To guard against future floods and sea level rise, the New York City Department of Design and Construction (NYCDDC) is undertaking a major coastal resiliency project along the Red Hook waterfront. The project will achieve flood protection to an elevation of 10 feet and improve the public environment by expanding the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway.

EnTech is providing air quality monitoring for the $218 million project, which entails a system of floodwalls, deployable flood gates, raised street grades, and other resilience measures. The project’s 1.5-mile corridor is mostly located within public ROW one block inland from the coastline, paralleling the neighborhood’s western and southern edges.

EnTech’s instrumentation and monitoring team is responsible for measuring particulate matter—including PM2.5 and PM10—throughout the project corridor. The team developed an air quality monitoring plan and deployed instruments in the field to measure particle concentration, humidity, windspeed, and other weather conditions. During construction, the team is monitoring instrumentation data daily for conformance with allowable limits and analyzing fluctuations in emissions levels.