AUTOMATIC BOTTLE SEALING MECHANISM FOR SEQUENTIAL SAMPLING OF VOLATILE ORGANICS IN WATER1

ABSTRACT: The design, construction, and evaluation of two automatic bottle sealing mechanisms for the collection of volatile organic compounds in water are described. Manually collected samples were either stored in uncapped bottles or in bottles capped with the automatic bottle sealing mechanisms. After 24 hours' storage, significant losses of volatile compounds from uncapped samples occurred even if the samples were stored at 4°C, but not for the samples capped with the automatic bottle sealing mechanisms. The mechanism for sealing the sample bottles was integrated into a commercial sampler with minor modifications to the sampler. The sampling system was then evaluated under controlled conditions to simulate actual field sampling. The results showed that the system was suitable for taking sequential discrete water samples automatically for 24 hours without significant losses of volatile organic compounds.     

Sensitivity analysis of ground-level ozone concentration to emission changes in two urban regions of southeast Texas

Air pollutant emission is one of the predominant factors affecting urban air quality such as ground-level ozone formation. This paper assesses the impact of changing emission inventory scenarios, based on combinations of point, mobile, area/non-road and biogenic sources, on the tropospheric ozone concentration in two southeast Texas urban areas, i.e. Houston-Galveston and Beaumont-Port Arthur, during the rapid ozone formation event (ROFE) on August 25, 2000. The EPA's Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) modeling system with 1999 national emission inventory (NEI99) estimates and updated SAPRC99 chemical mechanism are used in the sensitivity analysis for twelve different emission scenarios. Based on model results, it is found that the point source emission of NOx and VOC contributes the greatest ozone peak in the ROFE. Removing Texas point sources of VOC and NOx emission from the inventory results in a reduction in peak O3 concentration by 128 and 70 ppbv in Houston urban area, respectively. Similar but less drastic impact from point source is also observed in the Beaumont-Port Arthur area. The effect on peak ozone concentration due to mobile, area and non-road sources emissions are less significant compared to that of point source emission. Reducing VOC emission appears to be more effective than reducing NOx emission in lowering peak O3 concentration in the studied region. Although biogenic emission can contribute up to 37 ppbv of peak ozone level over a large area, the affected area is away from the urban region of concern, and should not be the main cause for O3 non-attainment in the two urban areas. Removing CO emission from mobile sources does not lead to significant reduction (< 1 ppbv) in ozone concentrations. The modeled data also show that the transport of O3 precursors from adjacent states can cause a significant ozone plume near Beaumont due to its proximity to the state border based on the conditions during the August 25, 2000 O3 episode.     

Green technologies for sustainable environment: an introduction

Environmental Science and Pollution Research -     

Fatty acid fouling of forward osmosis membrane: Effects of pH, calcium, membrane orientation, initial permeate flux and foulant composition

Octanoic acid (OA) was selected to represent fatty acids in effluent organic matter (EOM). The effects of feed solution (FS) properties, membrane orientation and initial permeate flux on OA fouling in forward osmosis (FO) were investigated. The undissociated OA formed a cake layer quickly and caused the water flux to decline significantly in the initial 0.5 hr at unadjusted pH 3.56; while the fully dissociated OA behaved as an anionic surfactant and promoted the water permeation at an elevated pH of 9.00. Moreover, except at the initial stage, the sudden decline of water flux (meaning the occurrence of severe membrane fouling) occurred in two conditions: 1. 0.5 mmol/L Ca^2 +, active layer facing draw solution (AL-DS) and 1.5 mol/L NaCl (DS); 2. No Ca^2 +, active layer-facing FS (AL-FS) and 4 mol/L NaCl (DS). This demonstrated that cake layer compaction or pore blocking occurred only when enough foulants were absorbed into the membrane surface, and the water permeation was high enough to compact the deposit inside the porous substrate. Furthermore, bovine serum albumin (BSA) was selected as a co-foulant. The water flux of both co-foulants was between the fluxes obtained separately for the two foulants at pH 3.56, and larger than the two values at pH 9.00. This manifested that, at pH 3.56, BSA alleviated the effect of the cake layer caused by OA, and OA enhanced BSA fouling simultaneously; while at pH 9.00, the mutual effects of OA and BSA eased the membrane fouling.