Download Air Quality and Meteorological Information of Chile

Download air quality and meteorological information of Chile from the National Air Quality System (S.I.N.C.A.)< https://sinca.mma.gob.cl/> dependent on the Ministry of the Environment and the Meteorological Directorate of Chile (D.M.C.)< https://www.meteochile.gob.cl/> dependent on the Directorate General of Civil Aeronautics.

AtmChile

AtmChile is an R package designed to download and compile information on air quality and meteorological parameters in Chile. It sources data from:

• SINCA: National Air Quality System (Ministry of the Environment).
• DMC: Meteorological Directorate of Chile (Directorate General of Civil Aeronautics).

Project developed by: Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences of the University of Chile. Funding: FONDECYT Project 1200674.

Installation

You can install the stable version from CRAN:

install.packages("AtmChile")

Or the development version from GitHub:

# install.packages("devtools")
devtools::install_github("franciscoxaxo/AtmChile")

Usage

Load the library:

library(AtmChile)

1. ChileAirQuality

Retrieves air quality data from the National Air Quality System (SINCA).

Available Parameters:

How to find station codes: To view the full table of available monitoring stations and their codes (e.g., "SA" for Parque O'Higgins), run the function without arguments:

# View available stations
stations <- ChileAirQuality()
print(stations)

Arguments:

• Comunas: Vector containing names or codes of the monitoring stations (e.g., "Cerrillos", "SA"). Use "all" for all stations.
• Parametros: Vector containing the names of air quality parameters. Use "all" for all parameters.
• fechadeInicio: Start date (format "dd/mm/yyyy").
• fechadeTermino: End date (format "dd/mm/yyyy").
• Curar: Logical (TRUE/FALSE). Activates data curation for particulate matter, NOx, RH, and wind direction. Default: TRUE.
• Site: Logical. If TRUE, allows searching by station code instead of name in Comunas. Default: FALSE.
• st: Logical. If TRUE, includes validation reports from SINCA ("NV": Not Validated, "PV": Pre-Validated, "V": Validated). Default: FALSE.

Examples:

# Example 1: Basic request by name
data_names <- ChileAirQuality(
  Comunas = "Cerrillos",
  Parametros = c("PM10", "PM25"),
  fechadeInicio = "01/01/2020",
  fechadeTermino = "01/01/2021"
)

# Example 2: Request by Station Code (Site = TRUE) without curation
data_codes <- ChileAirQuality(
  Comunas = c("SA", "CE"),
  Parametros = c("NO2", "O3"),
  fechadeInicio = "01/01/2020",
  fechadeTermino = "01/01/2021",
  Curar = FALSE,
  Site = TRUE
)

# Example 3: Download everything (All stations, all parameters)
data_all <- ChileAirQuality(
  Comunas = "all",
  Parametros = "all",
  fechadeInicio = "01/01/2020",
  fechadeTermino = "01/01/2021"
)

2. ChileClimateData

Retrieves climate data from the Meteorological Directorate of Chile (DMC).

Available Parameters:

• Temperatura (Temperature)
• PuntoRocio (Dew point)
• Humedad (Humidity)
• Viento (Wind)
• PresionQFF (Pressure at sea level)
• PresionQFE (Pressure at station level)

How to find station codes: To see the table with the available weather stations:

# View available climate stations
climate_stations <- ChileClimateData()
print(climate_stations)

Arguments:

• Estaciones: Vector containing codes of the monitoring stations (e.g., "180005").
• Parametros: Vector containing the names of climate parameters.
• inicio: Text string containing the start year (e.g., "2020").
• fin: Text string containing the end year (e.g., "2021").
• Region: Logical. If TRUE, allows entering the administrative region code (e.g., "XV", "RM") in Estaciones instead of the station code.

Examples:

# Example 1: Request by specific station codes
climate_data <- ChileClimateData(
  Estaciones = c("180005", "200006"),
  Parametros = c("Temperatura", "Humedad", "Viento"),
  inicio = "2020",
  fin = "2021"
)

# Example 2: Request by Administrative Region
region_data <- ChileClimateData(
  Estaciones = "II",
  Parametros = "Temperatura",
  inicio = "2020",
  fin = "2021",
  Region = TRUE
)

3. ChileAirQualityApp

A Shiny dashboard that provides a graphical interface for the package. It allows users to download data, perform analysis, visualize trends, and calculate descriptive statistics without writing code.

# Launch the local app
ChileAirQualityApp()

This dashboard is also hosted online at: ChileAirQualityApp on ShinyApps.io