Source identification of copper, lead, nickel, and zinc loading in wastewater reclamation plant influents from corrosion of brass in plumbing fixtures

A natural experiment indicated that a link between the presence and concentration of four elements, copper, lead, nickel, and zinc in the influent to two wastewater reclamation plants to the presence and concentrations of the same four elements in the tap water of residential properties. There were 36 populations of results that were assessed for the normality of their distribution, the difference in their median concentrations, the similarity in the ratios of their median concentrations, and the correlations of the concentrations. The results of this study suggest that brass corrosion is the major source of these four elements in the water reclamation plants influent and that there are two distinct populations of brass sources, those in the early stages of dezincification where the release of the non-copper elements is dominant and those in the later stages where the release of copper dominates and the type of brass that is corroding.     

Biomonitoring airborne parent and alkylated three-ring PAHs in the Greater Cologne Conurbation II: Regional distribution patterns

The spatial distribution of an important air pollutant class, three-ring polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and their derivatives (PAH-3), has been monitored for the Greater Cologne Conurbation (GCC) using pine needle as passive samplers. The GCC comprises one of the most heavily populated, trafficked, and industrialized regions in Germany. Here, 71 locations covering 3600 km² were sampled and, for the first time, isopleths maps constructed to investigate the regional variability in PAH-3 concentration and composition. The highest PAH-3 loads on needles (1000-1500 ng g⁻¹) were detected downwind of three lignite fuelled power plants, followed by Cologne City (600-700 ng g⁻¹) and smaller towns (400-600 ng g⁻¹), whereas rural and forest regions yielded PAH-3 loads of 60-300 ng g⁻¹. PAH-3 ratios facilitated source reconciliation, with high dibenzothiophene versus retene values indicating lignite combustion and high 9/(9 + 1)-methylphenanthrene ratios depicting traffic emissions in inner cities. PAH-3 ratios depended on topography and outlined the heavily industrialized Rhine Valley, demonstrating atmospheric dispersal of PAH-3.     

Impact of different land uses on polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon contamination in coastal stream sediments

PAHs are ubiquitous environmental pollutants that can cause adverse health and ecological effects. In the present study, we examined the impact of land use on the concentration and composition of PAHs in 28 coastal stream sediments on the Island of Oahu, Hawaii. In densely populated urban areas, the concentration range of total PAHs in the stream sediments affected by mixed residential and industrial activities (RI) are 0.40-9.05 ppm, which is significantly higher than the 0.36-4.21 ppm detected in the stream sediments affected predominantly by urban residential land uses (UR). The stream sediments affected by agricultural activities (AG) reported a concentration range of 0.09-2.14 ppm, which is lower than those of the RI and UR stream sediments. The molecular weight of PAH is a factor, as only high molecular weight (HMW) PAHs were significantly affected by land uses (ANOVA P = 0.009). Correlation analysis showed that only in the UR stream sediments were significant correlations observed between PAH concentration and two anthropogenic indicators: population density (r = 0.57, P = 0.027) and vehicle density (r = 0.55, P = 0.034). The fractional concentrations of PAHs were analyzed by using PCA analysis, which led to the separate clustering of the RI and AG stream sediments and suggest distinct PAH sources between the two land uses. Two PAH source indicators, including Ant/(Ant + Phe) and Fl/(Fl + Py), indicates that PAHs sources in the RI stream sediments are most likely of petroleum origin, while PAHs in the UR and AG stream sediments most likely came from combustion activities. In addition, the concentration and relative potency of carcinogenic PAHs in the coastal stream sediments exhibited similar patterns as the total PAH concentration with respect to land uses.     

A new approach to estimate nuclide ratios from measurements with activities close to background

Measurements of low-level radioactivity often give results of the order of the detection limit. For many applications, interest is not only in estimating activity concentrations of a single radioactive isotope, but focuses on multi-isotope analyses, which often enable inference on the source of the activity detected (e.g. from activity ratios). Obviously, such conclusions become questionable if the measurement merely gives a detection limit for a specific isotope. This is particularly relevant if the presence of an isotope, which shows a low signal only (e.g. due to a short half-life or a small transition probability), is crucial for gaining the information of interest.     

An Auxiliary Method to Reduce Potential Adverse Impacts of Projected Land Developments: Subwatershed Prioritization

An index based method is developed that ranks the subwatersheds of a watershed based on their relative impacts on watershed response to anticipated land developments, and then applied to an urbanizing watershed in Eastern Pennsylvania. Simulations with a semi-distributed hydrologic model show that computed low- and high-flow frequencies at the main outlet increase significantly with the projected landscape changes in the watershed. The developed index is utilized to prioritize areas in the urbanizing watershed based on their contributions to alterations in the magnitude of selected flow characteristics at two spatial resolutions. The low-flow measure, 7Q10, rankings are shown to mimic the spatial trend of groundwater recharge rates, whereas average annual maximum daily flow, , and average monthly median of daily flows, , rankings are influenced by both recharge and proximity to watershed outlet. Results indicate that, especially with the higher resolution, areas having quicker responses are not necessarily the more critical areas for high-flow scenarios. Subwatershed rankings are shown to vary slightly with the location of water quality/quantity criteria enforcement. It is also found that rankings of subwatersheds upstream from the site of interest, which could be the main outlet or any interior point in the watershed, may be influenced by the time scale of the hydrologic processes.     

Variability in Population Abundance and the Classification of Extinction Risk

Abstract: Classifying species according to their risk of extinction is a common practice and underpins much conservation activity. The reliability of such classifications rests on the accuracy of threat categorizations, but very little is known about the magnitude and types of errors that might be expected. The process of risk classification involves combining information from many sources, and understanding the quality of each source is critical to evaluating the overall status of the species. One common criterion used to classify extinction risk is a decline in abundance. Because abundance is a direct measure of conservation status, counts of individuals are generally the preferred method of evaluating whether populations are declining. Using the thresholds from criterion A of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List (critically endangered, decline in abundance of >80% over 10 years or 3 generations; endangered, decline in abundance of 50–80%; vulnerable, decline in abundance of 30–50%; least concern or near threatened, decline in abundance of 0–30%), we assessed 3 methods used to detect declines solely from estimates of abundance: use of just 2 estimates of abundance; use of linear regression on a time series of abundance; and use of state‐space models on a time series of abundance. We generated simulation data from empirical estimates of the typical variability in abundance and assessed the 3 methods for classification errors. The estimates of the proportion of falsely detected declines for linear regression and the state‐space models were low (maximum 3–14%), but 33–75% of small declines (30–50% over 15 years) were not detected. Ignoring uncertainty in estimates of abundance (with just 2 estimates of abundance) allowed more power to detect small declines (95%), but there was a high percentage (50%) of false detections. For all 3 methods, the proportion of declines estimated to be >80% was higher than the true proportion. Use of abundance data to detect species at risk of extinction may either fail to detect initial declines in abundance or have a high error rate.     

Receptor modeling for source apportionment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in urban atmosphere

This study reports source apportionment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in particulate depositions on vegetation foliages near highway in the urban environment of Lucknow city (India) using the principal components analysis/absolute principal components scores (PCA/APCS) receptor modeling approach. The multivariate method enables identification of major PAHs sources along with their quantitative contributions with respect to individual PAH. The PCA identified three major sources of PAHs viz. combustion, vehicular emissions, and diesel based activities. The PCA/APCS receptor modeling approach revealed that the combustion sources (natural gas, wood, coal/coke, biomass) contributed 19–97% of various PAHs, vehicular emissions 0–70%, diesel based sources 0–81% and other miscellaneous sources 0–20% of different PAHs. The contributions of major pyrolytic and petrogenic sources to the total PAHs were 56 and 42%, respectively. Further, the combustion related sources contribute major fraction of the carcinogenic PAHs in the study area. High correlation coefficient (R ² > 0.75 for most PAHs) between the measured and predicted concentrations of PAHs suggests for the applicability of the PCA/APCS receptor modeling approach for estimation of source contribution to the PAHs in particulates.     

车辆限行前后奥运场馆附近空气中苯系物污染特征与来源

在"好运北京"体育赛事车辆限行前后对北京奥运场馆,即四环路健翔桥附近空气中的6种苯系物进行了连续监测。监测结果显示,被测空气的苯系物中甲苯所占比例最大,为32.1%~42.5%,限行后总苯系物平均质量浓度降低了近47%。车辆限行前后,苯系物呈现类似的日变化规律,在交通早、晚高峰时出现峰值。限行前苯系物处于累积状态,日最高值出现在18点,限行后苯系物处于扩散状态,日最高值出现在8点。苯系物来源解析表明,整个交通管制期间苯/甲苯浓度的比值为0.49~0.55,且各苯系物具有良好的相关性,证明被测空气中苯系物具有良好的同源性,均来自汽车尾气。限制车流量可有效降低空气中苯系物浓度。     

应用有限体积法分析污染源排放对饮用水源的影响

根据南京市5家市政水厂水源保护区的污染源调查结果建立了长江南京段水动力和有限体积法水质数学模型,并结合各污染源的污染强度和排放规律,分析了枯水期在不同水文情况下,污染源排放对饮用水源地水质的影响.有限体积法的模拟结果与常规分析的监测结果均表明,水厂受污染程度为:上元门水厂＞北河口水厂＞城北水厂＞浦口水厂＞城南水厂.主要污染源为水量较大,且有一定污染的入江河流.