Quantifying the seasonal variations in and regional transport of PM.sub.2.5 in the Yangtze River Delta region, China: characteristics, sources, and health risks

• Published in: Atmospheric chemistry and physics 2023-09, Vol.23 (17), p.9837
• Main Authors: Zhan, Yangzhihao, Xie, Min, Zhao, Wei, Wang, Tijian, Gao, Da, Chen, Pulong, Tian, Jun, Zhu, Kuanguang, Li, Shu, Zhuang, Bingliang, Li, Mengmeng, Luo, Yi, Zhao, Runqi
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Air pollution; Health; Health aspects; Local transit
• ISSN: 1680-7316

Given the increasing complexity of the chemical composition of PM.sub.2.5, identifying and quantitatively assessing the contributions of pollution sources has played an important role in formulating policies to control particle pollution. This study provides a comprehensive assessment between PM.sub.2.5 chemical characteristics, sources, and health risks based on sampling data conducted over 1 year (March 2018 to February 2019) in Nanjing. Results show that PM.sub.2.5 exhibits a distinct variation across different seasons, which is primarily driven by emissions, meteorological conditions, and the chemical conversion of gaseous pollutants. First, the chemical mass reconstruction shows that secondary inorganic aerosols (62.5 %) and carbonaceous aerosols (21.3 %) contributed most to the PM.sub.2.5 mass. The increasing oxidation rates of SO.sub.2 and NO.sub.2 from summer to winter indicate that the secondary transformation of gaseous pollutants is strongly positively correlated with relative humidity. Second, the positive matrix factorization (PMF) method shows that identified PM.sub.2.5 sources include secondary inorganic aerosol source (SIS, 42.5 %), coal combustion (CC, 22.4 %), industry source (IS, 17.3 %), vehicle emission (VE, 10.7 %), fugitive dust (FD, 5.8 %), and other sources (1.3 %). The Hybrid Single-Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory (HYSPLIT) model and the concentration-weighted trajectory (CWT) analysis are used to further explore different spatial distributions and regional transport of sources. The concentrations (10-11 µg m.sup.-3) of SIS and CC distribute in Nanjing and central China in winter. The concentrations (8-10 µg m.sup.-3) of IS and VE are potentially located north of Jiangsu, Anhui, and Jiangxi. Finally, the health risk assessment indicates that the carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic risks of toxic elements (Cr, As, Ni, Mn, V, and Pb) mainly come from IS, VE, and CC, which are within the tolerance or acceptable level. Although the main source of pollution in Nanjing is SIS at present, we should pay more attention to the health burden of vehicle emissions, coal combustion, and industrial processes.