TY - JOUR
T1 - Concentrations of individual fine particulate matter components in the USA around July 4th
AU - Dickerson, Aisha S.
AU - Benson, Adam F.
AU - Buckley, Barbara
AU - Chan, Elizabeth A.W.
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank Joann Rice, Dr. Jennifer Richmond-Bryant, Dr. Steven Dutton, and Dr. John Vandenberg for technical review and helpful comments regarding this manuscript. This research was supported in part by an appointment to the Research Participation Program for the US EPA, Office of Research and Development, administered by the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education through an interagency agreement between the US Department of Energy and EPA.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016, Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht (outside the USA).
PY - 2017/4/1
Y1 - 2017/4/1
N2 - Fireworks emit particulate matter (PM) air pollution. Laboratory and epidemiologic studies have linked exposure to PM with cardiovascular and respiratory effects. Although it was reported that the mass of total PM with a nominal mean aerodynamic diameter less than or equal to 2.5 μm (PM2.5) is elevated on July 4th and 5th, no studies to date have used national, multi-year air quality monitoring data to determine which individual PM2.5 components increase due to July 4th fireworks. To evaluate this, we compiled and analyzed 24-h average PM2.5 air quality measurements collected by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Chemical Speciation Network monitors positioned at 379 urban sites across the USA over the years 2000 to 2014. By combining all individual daily mean PM2.5 concentrations recorded and viewing the arithmetic mean concentrations over time, we observed sharp and statistically significant increases in the concentrations of the firework-related chemicals barium, chlorine, copper, magnesium, potassium, and strontium on July 4th, which persisted through July 5th. There were also modest, but still statistically significant, increases of the concentrations of the firework-related components aluminum, arsenic, antimony, chromium, phosphorous, sulfur, titanium, and zinc on July 4th. Concentrations of elemental and organic carbon, calcium, cesium, iron, nickel, and sodium did not significantly increase on July 4th. These findings provide important information about changes in ambient air quality around Independence Day in the USA.
AB - Fireworks emit particulate matter (PM) air pollution. Laboratory and epidemiologic studies have linked exposure to PM with cardiovascular and respiratory effects. Although it was reported that the mass of total PM with a nominal mean aerodynamic diameter less than or equal to 2.5 μm (PM2.5) is elevated on July 4th and 5th, no studies to date have used national, multi-year air quality monitoring data to determine which individual PM2.5 components increase due to July 4th fireworks. To evaluate this, we compiled and analyzed 24-h average PM2.5 air quality measurements collected by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Chemical Speciation Network monitors positioned at 379 urban sites across the USA over the years 2000 to 2014. By combining all individual daily mean PM2.5 concentrations recorded and viewing the arithmetic mean concentrations over time, we observed sharp and statistically significant increases in the concentrations of the firework-related chemicals barium, chlorine, copper, magnesium, potassium, and strontium on July 4th, which persisted through July 5th. There were also modest, but still statistically significant, increases of the concentrations of the firework-related components aluminum, arsenic, antimony, chromium, phosphorous, sulfur, titanium, and zinc on July 4th. Concentrations of elemental and organic carbon, calcium, cesium, iron, nickel, and sodium did not significantly increase on July 4th. These findings provide important information about changes in ambient air quality around Independence Day in the USA.
KW - Air pollution
KW - Ambient air quality
KW - Fine particulate matter
KW - Fireworks
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84988346672&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84988346672&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s11869-016-0433-0
DO - 10.1007/s11869-016-0433-0
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84988346672
SN - 1873-9318
VL - 10
SP - 349
EP - 358
JO - Air Quality, Atmosphere and Health
JF - Air Quality, Atmosphere and Health
IS - 3
ER -