Chemical composition and source apportionment of PM1 and PM2.5 in a national coal chemical industrial base of the Golden Energy Triangle, Northwest China

Xiaoxue Liang; Tao Huang; Siying Lin; Jinxiang Wang; Jingyue Mo; Hong Gao; Zhanxiang Wang; Jixiang Li; Lulu Lian; Jianmin Ma

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.12.335

Chemical composition and source apportionment of PM₁ and PM_2.5 in a national coal chemical industrial base of the Golden Energy Triangle, Northwest China

Sci Total Environ. 2019 Apr 1:659:188-199. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.12.335. Epub 2018 Dec 24.

Authors

Xiaoxue Liang¹, Tao Huang¹, Siying Lin¹, Jinxiang Wang², Jingyue Mo³, Hong Gao¹, Zhanxiang Wang¹, Jixiang Li¹, Lulu Lian¹, Jianmin Ma⁴

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory for Environmental Pollution Prediction and Control, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China.
² School of Geography and Environmental Engineering, City University of Lanzhou, Lanzhou 730000, China.
³ School of Atmospheric Physics, Nanjing University of Information Science & Technology, Nanjing 210000, China.
⁴ Key Laboratory for Environmental Pollution Prediction and Control, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China; Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China. Electronic address: jmma@pku.edu.cn.

PMID: 31096369
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.12.335

Abstract

As part of the Energy Golden Triangle in northwest China and the largest coal-to-liquids industry in the world, the emission and contamination of fine particles in the Ningdong National Energy and Chemical Industrial Base (NECIB) are unknown. There are also large knowledge gaps in the association of air pollution with coal-to-liquids industry. This paper reports the chemical composition and source apportionment of PM₁ and PM_2.5 collected at two industrial sites Yinglite (YLT) and Baofeng (BF) from a field campaign during summer 2016 and winter 2017. Major chemical components in PM₁ and PM_2.5, including carbonaceous aerosols, water-soluble inorganic ions, and metal elements were analyzed. The Positive Matrix Factorization (PMF) model and the ISORROPIA II thermodynamic equilibrium model were used to track possible sources and contributions of these chemical components to the formation of the two fine particles. The results identified four primary sources of the fine particles, including vehicle emissions, biomass burning and waste incineration, the secondary aerosols and coal combustion, and soil dust. The PM₁ and PM_2.5 concentrations were higher in winter than summer. The summed secondary inorganic and carbonaceous aerosols accounted for 36.1-40.0% of PM_2.5 mass. The total mass of chemical components identified in the source apportionment only explained about 64.2 to 72.4% of the PM_2.5 mass. These results imply some missing sources in this large-scale coal chemical industry base. A coupled weather forecasting and atmospheric chemistry model WRF-Chem was employed to simulate the PM_2.5 mass and concentrations of OC and EC, and to examine the origins of PM_2.5 across the NECIB. The modeled concentrations of OC and EC were consistent with the sampled data, but the modeled mass of PM_2.5 is lower considerably than the measurements, again suggesting unknown sources of fine particles in this energy industrial base.

Keywords: Coal chemical industry; Mass reconstruction; PM(1) and PM(2.5); Source apportionment; WRF-chem modeling.