Detecting Fugitive Emissions of 1,3-Butadiene and Styrene from a Petrochemical Facility: An Application of a Mobile Laboratory and a Modified Proton Transfer Reaction Mass Spectrometer

Abstract

The petrochemical industry is a major source of 1,3-butadiene and styrene emissions within the Houston-Galveston area. Both compounds are listed as hazardous air pollutants by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) lists 1,3-butadiene as a highly reactive volatile organic compound. The Aerodyne Mobile Laboratory (AML) was deployed in 2009 as part of the Study of Houston Atmospheric Radical Precursor (SHARP) project to survey the petrochemical complexes in the Houston ship channel area for air toxics releases. This paper describes how the AML, equipped with a modified proton transfer reaction mass spectrometer configured to operate with NO + as the reagent ion, was used to characterize and quantify fugitive emissions. On April 26, 2009, the AML surveyed the Goodyear Tire and Rubber and Texas Petrochemical (GY-TPC) complex by circumnavigating the facility on public roads while making continuous measurements. The extensive suite of trace gas instrumentation onboard the AML was used to identify fugitive emissions of 1,3-butadiene and styrene from the industrial complex and to distinguish them from any interfering mobile sources. The mobile lab detected significantly enhanced concentrations of 1,3-butadiene (30 ppbv max) and styrene (15 ppbv max). These results are examined with respect to the prevailing winds and routine ambient air monitoring data from TCEQ's Milby Park AutoGC, which is located adjacent to the GY-TPC complex. Simple Gaussian point source plume model calculations predict source emission rates that are consistent with reported emission inventories.

Seasonal characteristics of biogenic and anthropogenic isoprene in tropical–subtropical urban environments

“…The tracer method that employs the ratio of isoprene to 1,3-butadiene is quite robust in urban areas where vehicular exhaust is the single-most dominant source of anthropogenic isoprene and 1,3-butadiene; however, the approach is not applicable in environments where anthropogenic isoprene and 1,3-butadiene can be partially contributed by nontraffic sources, such as industrial emissions and wood combustion (Borbon et al, 2001;Knighton et al, 2012;Hellen et al, 2012;Karl et al, 2003). In urban areas where vehicular exhaust dominates the sources of anthropogenic isoprene and 1,3-butadiene, the concentration ratio of isoprene to 1,3-butadiene obtained from pure traffic emissions (e.g., on-road vehicular emissions) can be used as a gauge to estimate the traffic contributions to ambient isoprene, and then separate biogenic isoprene from traffic emissions.…”

Air Pollutant Mapping with a Mobile Laboratory during the BEE-TEX Field Study

“…In this region, the TX Petrochemicals LP, Goodyear Houston Chemical Plant, and the PL Propylene LLC facilities account for emissions of 82, 1.3, and 8.5 tons per year of 1,3-butadiene emissions, respectively. These 1,3-butadiene sources, shown in Figure 1 , are from the same cluster of facilities investigated by Knighton et al 30 Other sources in the area are listed at less than 0.002 tons/year. The main cluster of emitters is located 2 km SSE of the region of enhanced 1,3-butadiene, and in the same direction as the dominant southerly wind.…”

The evolution of environmental forensics: From laboratory to field analysis

“…Most of these are vehicle‐mounted and the size of a van, and although not all necessarily incorporate field‐portable equipment, they are significantly more mobile than the laboratories described thus far. A range of air pollutants can be measured, including small molecules, such as nitrogen oxides, ozone, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide, as well as particle mass measurement, black carbon (Hagemann et al, ; Maciejczyk et al, ; Pirjola et al, ; Seakins, Lansley, Hodgson, Huntley, & Pope, ) and volatile organic compounds, such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylene, 1,3‐butadiene and styrene (Knighton et al, ; Yacovitch et al, ). Some researchers have demonstrated a mobile laboratory capable of measuring all of these air pollutants (Levy et al, ).…”

“…Maybe surprisingly, portable FTIR and Raman are not commonly reported on in the literature for environmental forensic investigations, although some applications are demonstrated. The use of infrared-based instruments is commonplace in air monitoring to determine the presence of air toxics, in particular CO 2 (Ashley, 2003;Hagemann et al, 2014;Knighton et al, 2012;Maciejczyk et al, 2004;Wright, Howe, & Jayanty, 1998). Portable FTIR is ideally suited to hazardous material (HAZMAT) incidents for identifying unknown gases and vapors (Levy & Diken, 2010;Shie & Chan, 2013).…”