A community odor survey can give more specific information about the nuisance coming from specific process operations in waste water plants. This tool can help define the frequency and the spatial distribution of the odor nuisance and by studying the results, links can be made to specific plant operations. Guidelines of the methodology and two case studies are presented. Such a survey has to be accepted and well announce within the community to assure a sufficient participation. The participant registered appreciation of the quality of the odor in the outdoor air (from no nuisance to severe nuisance) on an hourly basis when possible. Those responses were linked to meteorological data to know at least the wind speed and direction to determine the orientation of the odor dispersion.

This is an interesting tool to appreciate the spatial dispersion and the frequency of odor emission. Such a survey could also be linked with dispersion model to add more information and also to evaluate the appreciation of the odor nuisance by the community.