The influence of global climate change on the environmental fate of persistent organic pollutants: A review with emphasis on the Northern Hemisphere and the Arctic as a receptor

Abstract

Following worldwide bans and restrictions on the use of many persistent organic pollutants (POPs) from the late 1970s, their regional and global distributions have become governed increasingly by phase partitioning between environmental reservoirs, such as air, water, soil, vegetation and ice, where POPs accumulated during the original applications. Presently, further transport occurs within the atmospheric and aquatic reservoirs. Increasing temperatures provide thermodynamic forcing to drive these chemicals out of reservoirs, like soil, vegetation, water and ice, and into the atmosphere where they can be transported rapidly by winds and then recycled among environmental media to reach locations where lower temperatures prevail (e.g., polar regions and high elevations). Global climate change, widely considered as global warming, is also manifested by changes in hydrological systems and in the cryosphere; with the latter now exhibiting widespread loss of ice cover on the Arctic Ocean and thawing of permafrost.All of these changes alter the cycling and fate of POPs. There is abundant evidence from observations and modeling showing that climate variation has an effect on POPs levels in biotic and abiotic environments. This article reviews recent progress in research on the effects of climate change on POPs with the intention of promoting awareness of the importance of interactions between climate and POPs in the geophysical and ecological systems.

Feature extraction of climate variability, seasonality, and long‐term change signals in persistent organic pollutants over the Arctic and the Great Lakes

“…Our results (Figures 4 and 5) also show fluctuating and increased PCBs (including PCB-153) in the late half of the 2000s and a continuous decline of α-HCH during the same period, in line with the modeling result from Wöhrnschimmel et al [2013] and other analyses [Hung et al, 2010;Kong et al, 2014]. The change in the frequency of POP concentration time series might be linked to POP cycling in the Arctic and the GL environment due to rising air temperatures, sea ice retreat, and snowmelt [Becker et al, 2012;Ma et al, 2011Ma et al, , 2016.…”

“…[] and other analyses [ Hung et al ., ; Kong et al ., ]. The change in the frequency of POP concentration time series might be linked to POP cycling in the Arctic and the GL environment due to rising air temperatures, sea ice retreat, and snowmelt [ Becker et al ., ; Ma et al ., , ].…”

“…The step change point years (not shown here) and frequency periods coincided with those of several climate indices. Physicochemical properties of the examined POPs contributed to their associations with climate variability, as revealed previously [Hung et al, 2010;Ma et al, 2011Ma et al, , 2016. Wöhrnschimmel et al [2013] simulated the long-term trend of PCB-153 and α-HCH under the projected climate change scenarios in the 21st century.…”

“…The step change point years (not shown here) and frequency periods coincided with those of several climate indices. Physicochemical properties of the examined POPs contributed to their associations with climate variability, as revealed previously [ Hung et al ., ; Ma et al ., , ]. Wöhrnschimmel et al .…”

“…Although Alert in the Canadian high Arctic is a coastal site, it is ice bound throughout a year and is far away from the open ocean, even under extreme sea ice retreat due to strong warming in recent years. Lower temperatures and the lack of the open ocean lead to lower volatilization from open ocean water and melting ice due to rising temperatures [ Hung et al ., , ; Ma et al ., ].…”