Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in the surface soils from outskirts of Beijing, China

Abstract

Surface soils from the outskirts of Beijing were analyzed for 16 priority polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) using gas chromatography and mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The distribution map of total PAHs content was obtained as a contour plot. The concentration range of 16 PAHs varied by over two orders of magnitude from 0.016 lg g À1 in rural to 3.884 lg g À1 in suburban soils with the relatively standard deviation of 70.5%, showing large differences in the extent of PAHs pollution at the various sampling sites. It was notable that the concentration of BaP was 0.005-0.270 lg g À1 with a mean of 0.055 lg g À1. In general, the distribution of PAHs centered on the high molecular weight PAHs known to be carcinogenic. The 4-6 ring PAHs represented about 66% in rural samples and 70% in suburban soils of the total PAHs found. There was relatively good relationship among most of the individual PAHs and the compounds of Pyr, BaA, Flu, BbF, BaP, Chr and Ph gave strong correlation (r > 0.8) with the sum of PAHs. The selected marked compounds, a principal component analysis (PCA) and special PAHs compound ratios (Ph/An vs Flu/Pyr; P COMB= P EPA À PAHs) suggest the pyrogenic origins, especially traffic exhausts, are the dominant sources of PAHs in Beijing outskirts soils.

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon in urban soil from Beijing, China

“…There was also a better correlation between individual PAH and C 16 EPAPAHs (r>0.6) except for Na and Ace. The better correlation might attribute to the similar source of PAHs at different sampling sites (Ma et al, 2005;Weiss et d., 1994;Wilcke and Zech, 1997). BaP, the 1 ~ ~~~ ~~~ most potent carcinogenic PAHs, was significantly correlated with C 16 EPA-PAHs (~0 .…”

“…It was reported that PAHs in soils from urban areas were approximately 2-10 higher than those in rural areas (Lodovici et al, 1994;Tremolada et al, 1996;Wagrowski and Hitcs, 1997). Here, the mean of C 16 EPA-PAHs (1.637 kg/g) was nearly 4 times higher than that in the rural area (0.464 kg/g; Ma et al, 2005) and was much higher than those from the exurb of Beijing (0.058-0.141 pg/g; Ge et al, 2004).…”

“…A few studies have been published for soil in the typical areas in Beijing (c.g., highways, traffic line, residential and industrial areas) (Chu et ul., 2003;Ge et d., 2004;Ma et d., 2003;Tang et ul., 2005;Zheng et d., 1997). The grid sampling and analysis of the surface soil from outskirts of Beijing had been done for PAHs pollutants (Ma et d., 2005), but soil in the urban area with the many emission sources was excluded.…”

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and polychlorinated biphenyls in urban soils from Kathmandu, Nepal

“…The reason for the separation is unclear, because there are no remarkable differences detectable in the PCB patterns of those samples. (Wilcke et al, 1999a), Beijing, China (Ma et al, 2005), Romania (samples from Bucharest, Timisoara, Arad, Baia Mare, Ploiesti, Calimanesti; Covaci et al, 2001), several towns in the Seine Basin, France (Motelay-Massei et al, 2004), Bayreuth, Germany (Eusterbrock, 1999), Hamburg, Germany (Institut fü r Hygiene und Umwelt, 2001) and Stockholm, Sweden (Mandalakis et al, 2004). The 20 PAHs measured in Stockholm include three alkyl PAHs instead of NAPH, ACY and ACE.…”

Distribution and risks of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in suburban and rural soils of Beijing with various land uses

“…Generally, the urban activities increased the PAH contents in urban soils of Beijing ∼3.8 times over those of the suburban soils and ∼5.6 times over the rural soils. Ma et al (2005) reported a mean PAH concentration of 464 ng/g measured from 14 surface soils in southern Beijing between the fifth and sixth ring roads in 2001. To meet the increasing demands of environmental protection, the Beijing government gradually shut down and moved out the heavy industries in the suburban areas of Beijing, banned the use of wastewater irrigation, and encouraged the use of cleaner energy (Wu et al 2010).…”