Levoglucosan levels at background sites in Europe for assessing the impact of biomass combustion on the European aerosol background

Puxbaum, Hans; Caseiro, Alexandre; Sánchez-Ochoa, Asunción; Kasper‐Giebl, Anne; Claeys, Magda; Gelencsér, András; Legrand, Michel; Preunkert, Susanne; Pio, Casimiro

doi:10.1029/2006jd008114

Cited by 434 publications

(408 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…This is in accordance with Puxbaum et al (2007), who concluded that biomass smoke is the predominant organic aerosol constituent in the winter in mid and Western Europe. These authors also found that, from all of the studied locations, the Portuguese site was the one registering the most pronounced seasonality in the contribution of biomass burning to PM levels, with the highest concentrations in the winter and the lowest in the summer.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Contribution of residential wood combustion to PM10 levels in Portugal

Borrego

Valente

Carvalho

et al. 2010

Atmospheric Environment

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a b s t r a c tWood is commonly used in residential combustion for heating purposes; however, it can be a major source of air pollutants, namely fine particles, volatile organic compounds and carbon monoxide. Since 2004, the PM10 daily limit value has been surpassed in Portugal, and the European Commission has stated that plans and programs must be designed in order to reduce these levels. In Portugal, 18% of PM10 emissions are due to residential wood combustion, which may deeply impact the PM10 levels in the atmosphere. The main aim of this study is to investigate the impact of residential wood combustion on the air quality in Portugal. The air quality modelling system MM5/CHIMERE was applied over Portugal for a winter month, for the following three scenarios: the reference scenario, considering the actual emissions of PM10; scenario 1, where residential wood combustion emissions are not considered; and scenario 2, which takes into account a complete conversion from traditional fireplaces to certified appliances (with a 90% reduction in PM emissions). The residential wood combustion contribution to PM10 air quality concentration values during January 2007 ranges from 0 to 14 mg m À3 , with a mean contribution of 10 mg m À3 in the Lisboa area and 6 mg m À3 in the Porto region. Concerning the legislated values, the area where the daily average limit value (50 mg m À3 ) is exceeded decreases by 46% in the simulation when residential combustion is not considered. The modelling results for scenario 2 are not significantly different from those for scenario 1. In summary, the regulation of the residential wood combustion sector is as an effective way to reduce the PM10 levels in the atmosphere as regards air quality plans and programs.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Contribution of residential wood combustion to PM10 levels in Portugal

Borrego

Valente

Carvalho

et al. 2010

Atmospheric Environment

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“…Our results demonstrate that the blood pressure effect of BC observed in the United States and Europe (30,31) is not limited to high-income countries where BC is primarily from motor vehicles, although residential biomass combustion contributes to winter ambient air pollution in northern climates (32)(33)(34). The stronger health effect of BC from roadway exposure or combined roadway-biomass exposure may also be an important environmental risk factor for cardiovascular diseases in developing countries like China where the number of motor vehicles is rapidly increasing and household use of biomass and coal fuels persists (5,35).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 93%

Highway proximity and black carbon from cookstoves as a risk factor for higher blood pressure in rural China

Baumgartner

Zhang

Schauer

et al. 2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

176

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Air pollution in China and other parts of Asia poses large health risks and is an important contributor to global climate change. Almost half of Chinese homes use biomass and coal fuels for cooking and heating. China's economic growth and infrastructure development has led to increased emissions from coal-fired power plants and an expanding fleet of motor vehicles. Black carbon (BC) from incomplete biomass and fossil fuel combustion is the most strongly light-absorbing component of particulate matter (PM) air pollution and the second most important climate-forcing human emission. PM composition and sources may also be related to its human health impact. We enrolled 280 women living in a rural area of northwestern Yunnan where biomass fuels are commonly used. We measured their blood pressure, distance from major traffic routes, and daily exposure to BC (pyrolytic biomass combustion), water-soluble organic aerosol (organic aerosol from biomass combustion), and, in a subset, hopane markers (motor vehicle emissions) in winter and summer. BC had the strongest association with systolic blood pressure (SBP) (4.3 mmHg; P < 0.001), followed by PM mass and water-soluble organic mass. The effect of BC on SBP was almost three times greater in women living near the highway [6.2 mmHg; 95% confidence interval (CI), 3.6 to 8.9 vs. 2.6 mmHg; 95% CI, 0.1 to 5.2]. Our findings suggest that BC from combustion emissions is more strongly associated with blood pressure than PM mass, and that BC's health effects may be larger among women living near a highway and with greater exposure to motor vehicle emissions. cardiovascular disease | household air pollution | solid fuels P articulate matter (PM) air pollution is a leading health risk factor (1) and primary contributor to anthropogenic climate change (2). Air pollution is notoriously high in China and other parts of Asia. China's rising energy demands have led to increased air pollution emissions from coal-fired power plants (3). Its motorized transport growth is the fastest in the world with the number of motor vehicles projected to quadruple in the next two decades, reaching over 380 million by 2030 (4). Meanwhile, nearly half of all Chinese still cook and heat their homes with highly polluting biomass and coal fuels (5). The resulting PM concentrations routinely exceed the World Health Organization's (WHO) annual Air Quality Guideline of 10 μg/m 3 by a factor of 10 or more (6) and are associated with a number of adverse health outcomes, including cardiovascular diseases (1, 7).PM differs in chemical properties, size, and possibly effects on human health. Black carbon (BC) and organic carbon PM are emitted during incomplete biomass and fossil fuel combustion and seem to have important effects on both climate and human health. BC affects the regional and global climate by absorbing solar radiation and heating the atmosphere and is the second most important climate-forcing human emission, after carbon dioxide (8). Coemitted organic carbon may further influence radiative forcing by ac...

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“…Previously monitoring data from a background area which has not been contaminated by certain preponderant source emissions are often used to assess the source apportionment of the regional pollution (Puxbaum et al, 2007;Wang et al, 2014;Zhang et al, 2010). In this work, total suspended particulate (TSP) and fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) samples were collected in summer, 2013 at the Yellow River Delta, North China.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Radiocarbon-based impact assessment of open biomass burning on regional carbonaceous aerosols in North China

Zong

Chen

Tian

et al. 2015

Science of The Total Environment

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• PM 2.5 and TSP samples collected at Yellow River Delta were analyzed for OC and EC.• OC, EC, TSP and PM 2.5 concentrations were higher in daytime than in nighttime.• Radiocarbon ( 14 C) tracer, backward trajectories, and fire counts were used for the analysis.• Agricultural waste open burning was a main contributor to summer PM 2.5 , OC and EC. a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f o Samples of total suspended particulates (TSPs) and fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) were collected from 29th May to 1st July, 2013 at a regional background site in Bohai Rim, North China. Mass concentrations of particulate matter and carbonaceous species showed a total of 50% and 97% of the measured TSP and PM 2.5 levels exceeded the first grade national standard of China, respectively. Daily concentrations of organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) were detected 7.3 and 2.5 μg m −3 in TSP and 5.2 and 2.0 μg m −3 in PM 2.5 , which accounted 5.8% and 2.0% of TSP while 5.6% and 2.2% for PM 2.5 , respectively. The concentrations of OC, EC, TSP and PM 2.5 were observed higher in the day time than those in the night time. The observations were associated with the emission variations from anthropogenic activities. Two merged samples representing from south and north source areas were selected for radiocarbon analysis. The radiocarbon measurements showed 74% of water-insoluble OC (WINSOC) and 59% of EC in PM 2.5 derived from biomass burning and biogenic sources when the air masses were from south region, and 63% and 48% for the air masses from north, respectively. Combined with backward trajectories and daily burned area, open burning of agricultural wastes was found to be predominating, which was confirmed by the potential source contribution function (PSCF).

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Levoglucosan levels at background sites in Europe for assessing the impact of biomass combustion on the European aerosol background

Cited by 434 publications

References 53 publications

Contribution of residential wood combustion to PM10 levels in Portugal

Contribution of residential wood combustion to PM10 levels in Portugal

Highway proximity and black carbon from cookstoves as a risk factor for higher blood pressure in rural China

Radiocarbon-based impact assessment of open biomass burning on regional carbonaceous aerosols in North China

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