Measurements and PCA/APCS Analyses of Volatile Organic Compounds in Kaohsiung Municipal Sewer Systems, Southern Taiwan

Abstract

This study measured 71 volatile organic compounds (VOCs) collected using stainless steel canisters at 15 monitoring sites in two main Kaohsiung municipal sewers, A-Sewer and B-Sewer, during winter and summer periods in 2008 and 2009. The results indicate that the overall average of total VOCs, TVOC, in A-Sewer was 1173.51 ± 187.69 μg/m 3 , which was about 40% higher than that in B-Sewer (689.22 ± 151.64 μg/m 3 ). However, TVOC in the winter/dry season was about three (or five) times that in the summer/wet season for A-Sewer (or B-Sewer). For the A-Sewer, chlorinated organics, aromatics, and alkanes were predominant, and altogether contributed to about 90.0% of the TVOC in winter and about 70.6% in summer, with alkenes, ethers, ketones, and sulfur compounds as minor components. For B-sewer, aromatics, alkanes, and chlorinated organics were predominant, and altogether contributed to about 94.1% of the TVOC in winter and about 74.3% in summer, while others were minor ones. The principal component analysis (PCA) and absolute component scores (APCS) models indicate that the percentage source contributions for A-Sewer were solvent usage (31.65 ± 11.27%), oil refineries and storage leaks (28.71 ± 11.52%), auto paintings (19.14 ± 9.74%), asphalt plants (17.05 ± 8.73%), and others (3.45 ± 3.95%). The percentage source contributions for B-Sewer were printing factories (45.35 ± 9.19%), oil refineries and storage leaks (31.78 ± 8.59%), solvent usage (18.64 ± 8.50%), and dry cleaning (4.23 ± 4.70%).

Characteristics and Source Apportionment of Ambient Volatile Organic Compounds in a Science Park in Central Taiwan

“…Acetone is a widely-used organic solvent in chemical and semiconductor industries (Lu et al, 2006;Tsai et al, 2011;Lan et al, 2014). Meanwhile, trichlorofluoromethane and dichlorodifluoromethane were related to the emissions from refrigerator factories (Huang et al, 2012).…”

Source Apportionment of Air Pollution and Characteristics of Volatile Organic Compounds in a Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant, North Taiwan

“…Paint applications were correlated with toluene (Huang et al, 2012). CO 2 levels were related to the natural ventilation in the building (Madureira et al, 2016) while H 2 S and NH 3 were related to domestic wastewater decomposition (Jeon et al, 2009).…”

“…The variance of individual factors in PCA indicate the relative magnitudes among the dominant potential sources (Huang et al, 2012). After determining the number and variety of potential sources, APCS was applied to estimate the contribution of each pollution source to each pollutant.…”

Source Identification of VOCs in a Petrochemical Complex by Applying Open-Path Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometry

“…The odor problems related to petrochemical plants are often caused by VOCs emitted from stacks, leakages from pipelines and tanks, production processes and wastewater treatment (Kalabokas et al, 2001;Huang et al, 2012;Chen et al, 2013). People living near a petrochemical complex can thus suffer from direct and indirect exposure to unpleasant odors.…”