## 1 Introduction  
Environmental impacts from the development of banagrass (_Pemisetum purpneum_)-based ethanol production on Hawaii Island may create air quality problems. [PERSON] and [PERSON] (2016) [1] suggested that a cellulosic ethanol plant with a 9 million gallons of ethanol per year (MGY) capacity would meet about 2% of the State's highway fuel demand. This facility is designed to operate at full capacity 24 h/day, 7 days/week and 52 weeks/year (using references from the Pacific Biodiesel facility on Hawaii Island) (Pacific Biodiesel (PBD) was consulted for their operation schedule. PBD operates 24 h/day divided into three shifts and operate all year around. They also perform regular maintenance [2]). The daily target production level was estimated at approximately 24,657 gallons of ethanol. A total land area of 3080 ha was optimally located on the northern part of Hawaii Island in order to provide enough feedstock for the ethanol processing plant. Given an ethanol conversion rate of 80 gallons per dry ton of banagrass [3] and moisture content of banagrass at harvesting time of 70% [4], a total amount of 1056 wet tons of banagrass feedstock is required to meet the daily target amount of ethanol produced. Banagrass is hauled directly from the production site to the processing plant. The processed ethanol is then transported from the processing plant to Kawaiahe port and shipped to Oahu for blending. A large number of harvesters and heavy-duty trucks/trailers are required for these operations which can cause adverse impacts on air quality around feedstock production and ethanol processing areas due to daily extensive operations. Mechanical agricultural harvesting has been increasingly scrutinized as a major source of fugitive dust emissions, in the form of particulate matter (PM), in the air [5; 6; 7; 8]. California's Senate Bill 700 included agricultural operations as sources of air pollution for the state [5; 8]. In 1995, the EPA estimated PM from mechanical harvesting of three different crops--cotton, wheat and sorghum (see Section 9 of Compilation of Air Pollutant Emission Factors: Stationary Point And Area Sources [7]). The California Air Resources Board (CARB) calculated PM\({}_{10}\) emission for a number of crops such as almonds, corn, cotton, walnuts and wheat. However, PM\({}_{10}\) emission has not been estimated for banagrass harvesting on a commercial scale. Additionally, the Federal Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) established the pollutant emission limitation standard to determine whether a proposed project should be considered as a major stationary pollutant source [9; 10; 11]. Proposed projects that potentially emit 250 tons per year (tpy) or more of fugitive emission are considered as major stationary sources of pollution and require further PSD review [9; 10; 11]. Carbon dioxide (CO\({}_{2}\)) emission from transportation is the second largest source of CO\({}_{2}\) emission in the U.S, following electricity generation [12]. In 2014, transportation's share was about 31% of total U.S. CO\({}_{2}\) emissions [12]. CO\({}_{2}\) is also known as the primary greenhouse gas comprising about 80.9% of all the U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. Transportation produced approximately 25% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in the same year [12]. By EPA standards, any proposed project that has the potential of emitting 75,000 typ of CO\({}_{2}\) equivalent or more is defined as having a significant PSD level and considered a major stationary pollution source [9; 11]. Harvesting and transporting of feedstock and transporting of ethanol fuel are the likely operations that will impact air quality due to CO\({}_{2}\) emission. This study examines the potential environmental impacts from the harvesting and transporting of banagrass from production areas to a banagrass-based ethanol producing plant and transporting ethanol from the processing plant to the port for shipment to Oahu for blending.