Evaluation and application of a semi-continuous chemical characterization system for water soluble inorganic PM<sub>2.5</sub> and associated precursor gases

Abstract

Abstract. Water soluble inorganic particles components (Cl) and concentrations of their associated precursor gases (HCl, SO 2 , HNO 3 , NH 3 ) were semi-continuously measured using the Dionex Gas Particle Ion Chromatography (GPIC) system. Sampling was conducted adjacent to a high traffic street in downtown Toronto, Canada from June 2006 to March 2007. This study evaluated the precision and accuracy of field sampling measurements with the GPIC both relative to filter based measurements and other co-located semi-continuous instruments (R&P 8400N Nitrate Monitor, API Fluorescent SO 2 Gas Analyzer, and Aerodyne C-ToF-AMS). High temporal resolution PM 2.5 mass reconstruction is presented by combining GPIC measured inorganic species concentrations and Sunset Laboratory OCEC Analyzer determined organics concentrations. Field sampling results were also examined for seasonal and diurnal variations. HNO 3 and particulate nitrate exhibited diurnal variation and strong partitioning to the gas phase was observed during the summer. Ammonia and particulate ammonium also demonstrated seasonal differences in their diurnal profiles. However, particulate sulphate and SO 2 showed no diurnal variation regardless of season suggesting dominant transport from regional sources throughout the year.

Development of an Automated System (PPWD/PILS) for Studying PM2.5 Water-Soluble Ions and Precursor Gases: Field Measurements in Two Cities, Taiwan

“…Some semi-continuous instruments with IC have been developed, including the particle-into-liquid sampler (PILS) (Weber et al, 2001); the wet-annular denuder/steam-jet aerosol collector (WAD/SJAC) (Trebs et al, 2004) and its commercialized version, the Monitor for AeRosols and GAses in ambient air (MARGA) (ten Brink et al, 2007;Makkonen et al, 2012); the Gas-Particle Ion Chromatography system (GPIC, Dionex Corporation, USA; Godri et al, 2009) and its modified design, the Ambient Ion MonitorIon Chromatograph (AIM-IC; URG Corporation, USA; Nie et al, 2010) consisting of a parallel plate wet denuder (PPWD) and a particle supersaturation chamber (PSSC). However, sampling bias of these monitors was found in performance tests conducted by several research groups.…”

A Comparison Between a Semi-Continuous Analyzer and Filter-Based Method for Measuring Anion and Cation Concentrations in PM10at an Urban Background Site in London

“…To automate the chemical analysis of these water soluble inorganic species and to meet the need of higher time resolution information of aerosol composition, several semi-continuous analyzers have been developed in the last decade for both organic (Birch 1998;Jayne et al 2000;Sorooshian et al 2006;Ng et al 2011) and inorganic aerosol species (Khlystov et al 1995;Weber et al 2001;Moon et al 2006;ten Brink et al 2007;Godri et al 2009). Aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) technology (Jayne et al 2000) has the advantage of measuring all non-refractory aerosols including inorganic and organic components; however, its particle size cut-off is limited at PM 1 and it is unable to measure refractory aerosols such as sodium chloride.…”

“…The particle-into-liquid sampler (PILS; Weber et al 2001) coupled with an IC combines two aerosol technologies-particle growth in a mixing condensation particle counter and droplet collection by a single jet inertial impactor-and takes advantage of the principle of steamjet aerosol collector (SJAC; Khlystov et al 1995). Other methods based on the same principle are the Dionex gas particle ion chromatography (GPIC; Godri et al 2009), the MARGA air monitor (measuring aerosol and gases; ten Brink et al 2007), and the series of URG 9000 (A-D) Ambient Ion Monitors (Moon et al 2006). These IC methods have the advantage over the AMS technology of capturing all the soluble compounds of interest for size fractions greater than PM 1 .…”

A semiautomatic system for soluble lead and copper monitoring in atmospheric deposition by coupling of passive elemental fractionation sampling and voltammetric measurement on screen-printed gold electrodes

“…A particleinto-liquid collector for rapid measurement of aerosol bulk chemical composition was described by Weber et al [4] for chloride, nitrate, sulfate, sodium, ammonium, calcium, and potassium monitoring by the combination of active sampling, transferring the analytes to aqueous phase and online IC measurement. A range of similar instruments that separate gases and aerosols into a liquid sample stream for online analysis, include the ambient ion monitor [5], the gas-particle ion chromatography system [6] and the recently developed MARGA (monitor for aerosols and gases in ambient air) [7,8]. In contrast, we have found no references about automatic or semiautomatic systems for field trace element monitoring in atmospheric samples, so we aim to explore such possibility in this work.…”