A review of biomass burning: Emissions and impacts on air quality, health and climate in China

Abstract

Biomass burning (BB) is a significant air pollution source, with global, regional and local impacts on air quality, public health and climate. Worldwide an extensive range of studies has been conducted on almost all the aspects of BB, including its specific types, on quantification of emissions and on assessing its various impacts. China is one of the countries where the significance of BB has been recognized, and a lot of research efforts devoted to investigate it, however, so far no systematic reviews were conducted to synthesize the information which has been emerging. Therefore the aim of this work was to comprehensively review most of the studies published on this topic in China, including literature concerning field measurements, laboratory studies and the impacts of BB indoors and outdoors in China. In addition, this review provides insights into the role of wildfire and anthropogenic BB on air quality and health globally. Further, we attempted to provide a basis for formulation of policies and regulations by policy makers in China.

Assessment of carbonaceous aerosols in Shanghai, China – Part 1: long-term evolution, seasonal variations, and meteorological effects

“…In summer, for example, strong solar radiation tends to facilitate photochemical reactions and thus enhance the formation of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) to organic aerosols (Tuet et al, 2017;Malecha and Nizkorodov, 2016). Burning of crop residues is also an important source of OC in China (Cheng et al, 2014;Hallquist et al, 2009;Zhang and Cao, 2015), while the burning activities are highly season dependent and mostly concentrated in fall (Chen et al, 2017b). Cold air masses prevail during winter and early spring, transporting high levels of pollutants (including OC and its precursors emitted from coal-based heating system) from northern China to the Yangtze River Delta region (Chen et al, 2017a).…”

Thermal Properties of Biochars Derived from Waste Biomass Generated by Agricultural and Forestry Sectors

“…Reza et al [32] also reported that the biochar was about 41-90% of the original mass, but contained 80-95% of the fuel value of the raw feedstock, i.e., biochar had higher energy density than the raw biomass due to the mass lost to volatilization. In China, families used to collect agricultural and forestry biomass such as crop residuals, weeds, branches and leaves for cooking and heating [33], and lots of biomass residues were burnt in the field, which caused serious air pollution [34]. Wang et al [35] reported that PM2.5 concentrations increased because of biomass burning to an average of 134 µg m −3 , which was three times worse than clear days in Shanghai (from 2011 to 2013).…”

Spatial and seasonal variations of aerosols over China from two decades of multi-satellite observations – Part 1: ATSR (1995–2011) and MODIS C6.1 (2000–2017)

“…Examples of other factors affecting interannual and seasonal variations of the aerosol optical depth (AOD) over China are the generation and transport of desert dust (e.g., Proestakis et al, 2018;Wang et al, 2008), seasonal biomass burning (e.g., Chen et al, 2017a) and meteorological conditions and large-scale circulation (Zhu et al, 2012). Both the direct production of aerosol particles and the emission of aerosol precursor gases, such as SO 2 , NO 2 and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), contribute to the observed aerosol concentrations, which manifest themselves as particulate matter (PM) or AOD (Bouarar et al, 2017).…”