Air pollution is a critical environmental concern that poses significant health risks and affects multiple aspects of human life. ML algorithms provide promising results for air pollution prediction. In the existing scientific literature, Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) predictive models, as well as their combination with other statistical and machine learning approaches, have been utilized for air pollution prediction. However, these combined algorithms may not always provide suitable results due to the stochastic nature of the factors that influence air pollution, improper hyperparameter configurations, or inadequate datasets and data characterized by great variability and extreme dispersion. The focus of this paper is applying and comparing the performance of Support Vector Machine and hybrid LSTM regression models for air pollution prediction. To identify optimal hyperparameters for the LSTM model, a hybridization with the Genetic Algorithm is proposed. To mitigate the risk of overfitting, the bagging technique is employed on the best LSTM model. The proposed predicitive model aims to determine the Common Air Quality Index level for the next hour in Niksic, Montenegro. With the hybridization of the LSTM algorithm and by applying the bagging technique, our approach aims to significantly enhance the accuracy and reliability of hourly air pollution prediction. The major contribution of this paper is in the application of advanced machine learning analysis and the combination of the LSTM, Genetic Algorithm, and bagging techniques, which have not been previously employed in the analysis of air pollution in Montenegro. The proposed model will be made available to interested management structures, local governments, national entities, or other relevant institutions, empowering them to make effective pollution level predictions and take appropriate measures.
