Hi, Matt here and looking to help you.
Please define the project more clearly. As I understand the description there should be differently coloured particles for each year selected. So there should probably be checkboxes for years to calculate and draw particles?
As you have your script now all particles "die" after a period of time. So they are generated constantly and if you change the year, the particles from a previous year will slowly "die" while particles from new selected year will keep showing and dying etc.
Either way the speed will quickly become an issue. I would rework the script to use (fast) GreenSock javascript library. In certain way the script itself would be simplified - for each year a special "timeline" would be defined. If it's selected e.g. checked then it starts animating (can be a reworked version of current script), when checked off, it dies immediately or as is now.
I'm interested in your opinion - so please do not award this bid before the script to create is completely well defined (for the implementation).
Looking forward to your reply,
Matt