The DoD conducts military training and testing activities both around the world and in the United States. Often the training and testing lands are far from human inhabitants, but others are in close proximity to human settlement.

Military testing and training activities generally have the potential to generate emissions. For example, these emissions may result from the dust generated by vehicle operation and convoys. In other instances, wildland fires may result from live-fire training and testing activities. When close to human settlement, particularly where training lands reside in a nonattainment area under the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS), the issue of emissions requires sharpened attention.

As a result, SERDP and ESTCP investments have focused on developing and demonstrating technologies and methods to characterize and monitor DoD’s fugitive dust and fire emissions, predict their dispersion and contributions to local and regional air quality, and assess and reduce their environmental impacts.