Pollution characteristics and health risk assessment of benzene homologues in ambient air in the northeastern urban area of Beijing, China

Li, Lei; Li, Hong; Zhang, Xinmin; Wang, Li; Xu, Lu; Wang, Xuezhong; Yu, Yongtae; Zhang, Yujie; Cao, Guan

doi:10.1016/s1001-0742(13)60400-3

Cited by 105 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…It is evident that the outdoor concentrations of BTEX compounds (25.8-236.0 μg/m 3 ) in this study were at least a factor of 3 higher than those reported in Chinese cities or rural areas (Zhong et al, 2005;Guo et al, 2003Guo et al, , 2006Wang and Zhao, 2008;Ling et al, 2011;Zhang et al, 2012;Li et al, 2014), indicating that the pollution levels of BTEX in this rural area of the NCP are indeed very serious in winter. The indoor pollution levels of BTEX (254.5-1552.9 μg/m 3 ) were found to be more serious, a factor of 1.26 higher than the outdoor levels.…”

Section: Comparison With Previous Studiescontrasting

confidence: 51%

“…According to USEPA document "EPA-540-R-070-002", if the HQ of a specific pollutant is lower than 1, the pollutant has no obvious non-cancer risk to human health, and the acceptable value of cancer risk for an ordinary adult is 1E − 06 (Li et al, 2014). The HQ values of 0.38 and 0.32 in this work for indoor and outdoor benzene respectively suggest that benzene poses no obvious non-cancer risk to the farmers in the rural area.…”

Section: Health Risk Assessmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The ambient levels of both indoor (Zhong et al, 2005;Guo et al, 2003) and outdoor BTEX in cities (Yuan et al, 2010;Wang et al, 2012;Li et al, 2014 have been extensively investigated. However, the levels in rural areas have only rarely been reported (Guo et al, 2006).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Serious BTEX pollution in rural area of the North China Plain during winter season

Liu

Zhang

et al. 2015

Journal of Environmental Sciences

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Atmospheric BTEX compounds (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes) in a rural site of the North China Plain (NCP) were preliminarily investigated in winter, and the outdoor concentrations (25.8-236.0 μg/m 3 ) were found to be much higher than those reported in urban regions. The pollution of BTEX inside a farmer's house was even more serious, with combined concentrations of 254.5-1552.9 μg/m 3 . Based on the ratio of benzene to toluene (1.17 ± 0.34) measured, the serious BTEX pollution in the rural site was mainly ascribed to domestic coal combustion for heating during the winter season. With the enhancement of farmers' incomes in recent years, coal consumption by farmers in the NCP is rapidly increasing to keep their houses warm, and hence the serious air pollution in rural areas of the NCP during winter, including BTEX, should be paid great attention.

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Section: Comparison With Previous Studiescontrasting

confidence: 51%

Section: Health Risk Assessmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Serious BTEX pollution in rural area of the North China Plain during winter season

Liu

Zhang

et al. 2015

Journal of Environmental Sciences

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“…This implies that a larger portion of China's benzene emissions are concentrated in the densely populated coastal regions and, therefore, a large proportion of the population is exposed to elevated benzene levels in the ambient air. Previous studies in urban areas of this region, such as Beijing Zhang et al, 2012a,b;Li et al, 2014) and Guangzhou (Wang et al, 2002;Barletta et al, 2008;Zhang et al, 2013), showed much higher benzene levels when compared to those reported in Europe, or in the United States. Even early in January-February 2001, benzene was found to pose potential health risks from a survey of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in 43 Chinese cities (Barletta et al, 2005), mostly in the eastern areas.…”

mentioning

confidence: 57%

“…To date, a systematic health risk assessment for benzene exposure has not been undertaken in China, and very few health risk studies are available with a focus on urban environments (Zhou et al, 2011;Zhang et al, 2012a;Li et al, 2014). The results of previous studies in urban areas cannot be regarded as representative of those in the whole developed coastal regions because field measurements were conducted at sites close to emission sources, and conducted over very short time spans.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Ambient air benzene at background sites in China's most developed coastal regions: Exposure levels, source implications and health risks

Zhang

Wang

Zhang

et al. 2015

Science of The Total Environment

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Spatiotemporal patterns and source implications of aromatic hydrocarbons at six rural sites across China's developed coastal regions

et al. 2016

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Aromatic hydrocarbons are important anthropogenic precursors of tropospheric ozone and secondary organic aerosols. Here we measured ambient aromatic hydrocarbons from March 2012 to February 2014 at six rural sites in China's developed coastal regions. On average, benzene (B) comprised > 50% of total benzene (B), toluene (T), ethylbenzene (E), and xylenes (X) (BTEX) at sites in the Northeast China Plain (NECP) or in the North China Plain (NCP), whereas T, E, and X accounted for > 77% of total BTEX at sites in the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) and the Pearl River Delta in the south. BTEX at the northern sites was significantly correlated (p < 0.01) with combustion tracer‐carbon monoxide (CO) but weakly correlated with traffic marker‐methyl tert‐butyl ether (MTBE), suggesting that their main sources were coal and biofuel/biomass burning with substantially elevated B levels during the winter heating period. In contrast, BTEX at the southern sites originated mainly from traffic‐related and/or industrial emission sources, as indicated by the poor correlations with CO but highly significant (p < 0.01) correlations with MTBE and tetrachloroethylene, an industrial emission tracer. The B/CO emission ratios from measurement agreed within a factor of 2 with that of a previous widely used emission inventory of China, but the T/CO ratio at the NECP site and the o‐X/CO ratio at the NCP site were 29% and 38% of that in the inventory, respectively; the E/CO and X/CO ratios at the YRD site were 3.2–3.5 fold that in the emission inventory.

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Pollution characteristics and health risk assessment of benzene homologues in ambient air in the northeastern urban area of Beijing, China

Cited by 105 publications

References 21 publications

Serious BTEX pollution in rural area of the North China Plain during winter season

Serious BTEX pollution in rural area of the North China Plain during winter season

Ambient air benzene at background sites in China's most developed coastal regions: Exposure levels, source implications and health risks

Spatiotemporal patterns and source implications of aromatic hydrocarbons at six rural sites across China's developed coastal regions

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