From nuclear chemist to "tunnel rat" sounds like a sad story of decline. But for DRI Research Professor Bill Pierson, it has been a rewarding path of highly regarded scientific accomplishment and leadership.
From nuclear chemist to "tunnel rat" sounds like a sad story of decline.
But for DRI Research Professor Bill Pierson, it has been a rewarding path
of highly regarded scientific accomplishment and leadership.
Dr. Pierson came to DRI in 1987 as executive director of the Institute's Energy and Environmental Engineering Center (EEEC), bringing a national reputation for his work in chemistry and his innovative field techniques--particularly the use of roadway traffic tunnels for measuring on-road vehicle emissions.
Under Pierson's directorship were 70 employees with an annual research budget of $6 million. Center projects took EEEC to all 50 U.S. states and many foreign countries. Some of the busiest researchers working for Pierson were the "tunnel rats," teams of scientists measuring air pollution from the Lincoln Tunnel in New York City to the Van Nuys and Sepulveda tunnels in the Los Angeles area. In the air quality business, Pierson was "King Rat."
He stepped down from administration in 1995 to turn his full attention to research on automotive emissions--the culmination of more than 30 years of work.
Armed with a Ph.D. in nuclear chemistry from MIT, Pierson began his career at Ford Motor Company's Research Laboratories in 1962, nearly a decade ahead of the extraordinary boom in environmental research and regulation. Initially he was involved in a wide range of topics in nuclear chemistry, establishing a nuclear analytical capability at Ford and then applying it to nuclear spectroscopy, high-energy nuclear reactions, low-level tracers for heart research, and a method to determine the chemical composition of the topmost atomic layer of a solid.
 were used to obtain real-world auto emission data. This picture was shot when the tunnel was temporarily closed for cleaning. Photo by Douglas. E. MccKee |
That's when the tunnel work started. Pierson and his Ford laboratory colleagues came up with the idea of measuring vehicle exhaust from traffic in highway tunnels to get real numbers, and Ford's management agreed it was a good idea. Equipped with sampling and analytical methods that are primitive by today's standards, the scientists set up experiments. The first series of efforts were conducted using Pennsylvania's Allegheny and Tuscarora tunnels, and in Detroit and Windsor, Canada. The latter were important scientifically due to their urban locations.
Pierson introduced the method of capturing traffic emissions inside the tunnel while tracking the actual numbers of cars and trucks and the nature of the air flowing through. His technique accommodated the variability of real-world vehicle performance--factors such as vehicle age, operating condition, and driver behavior--and produced results with much greater scientific validity. After joining DRI, Pierson continued his tunnel approach on a large project involving the Ft. McHenry freeway tunnel in Baltimore and the Tuscarora Tunnel. His career as a "tunnel rat" was established.
"A freeway tunnel may sound like an unlikely location for air pollution research," Pierson says, "but it actually offers a well-defined sampling environment largely protected from weather and other pollutant sources. With the sampling instrumentation becoming available and the ability to count traffic, we could finally start producing some solid numbers." The real breakthrough for the tunnel approach occurred with the South Coast Air Quality Study (SCAQS) in the Los Angeles area in 1987. By this time, federal and state regulators were comparing local measurements with emissions models that predicted certain levels of vehicle pollution. The SCAQS findings, based on a study in the Van Nuys tunnel, concluded that the accepted models were projecting hydrocarbon emissions at only a quarter of what was actually occurring--a discrepancy that accounted for previously unexplained high levels of urban ozone.
"This upset a lot of people because all the models were being called into question," Pierson said. "For a while it was so bad people were referring to the tunnel work we did as the T-word." The experience had a long-lasting impact on air quality science. The Coordinating Research Council, a highly regarded organization established by the automotive and petroleum industries to foster research, initiated spring conferences on measuring real-world emissions that continue to this day.
 At the time, still a Ford scientist, Dr. Bill Pierson, right, plays a mandolin in a duet with John Foor, an employee of the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission, during a lunch break from conducting research in the Allegheny Tunnel in 1979. Photo by Douglas E. McKee |
Pierson's broad grasp of air quality research issues has also encompassed studies of acid deposition, visibility degradation, and major urban air quality problems and has resulted in more than 120 scientific publications. In 1995, the Air & Waste Management Association, the largest scientific body focusing on air quality work, gave Pierson the prestigious Chambers Award for "major contributions to the science of air pollution control." Closer to home, the Nevada Board of Regents awarded him its Faculty Achievement Award in 1993 and an Outstanding Administrator Award in 1995.
A minor stroke in 1997 stalled, but didn't stop, Pierson's prodigious scientific prowess. Today, it's diesel emissions that are driving the tunnel rat's research. Pierson serves on the Clean Air Science Advisory Committee, providing input to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on the health effects of airborne diesel particulate matter, and on the Board of Scientific Counselors which reviews the work of EPA's Office of Research and Development.
Pierson is the principal investigator on two new tunnel studies looking at the toxicity and health effects of diesel. The work will involve a team of Pierson's DRI colleagues using the Callaghan Tunnel in Boston and the Tuscarora Tunnel.
And, yes, it's quite all right to use the T-word again.
John Doherty
