American Association for Aerosol Research - Abstract Submission

AAAR 35th Annual Conference
October 17 - October 21, 2016
Oregon Convention Center
Portland, Oregon, USA

Abstract View


Evolution of Organic Aerosol (OA) Composition Emitted from Residential Coal Combustion

WEI ZHOU, Haixia Ren, Mo Xue, Jiming Hao, Jingkun Jiang, Tsinghua University

     Abstract Number: 177
     Working Group: Combustion

Abstract
In the absence of particulate matter (PM) control devices, residential coal combustion contributes significantly to ambient PM pollution, black carbon (BC) emissions, and PM health effects. Characterizing PM emissions from residential coal combustion with high time resolution is beneficial for developing control policies and evaluating the environmental impact of PM emissions. This study reported the evolution of organic aerosol (OA) composition formed during complete residential coal combustion processes, i.e., from fire start to fire extinction.

A residential coal combustion system includes a clean air supply system, a typical Chinese stove, a chamber collection system, and a dilution system were used for residential coal combustion experiments. A thermal desorption aerosol gas chromatograph and an aerosol chemical speciation monitor (ACSM) were used to in-situ measure OA composition. Three commonly used coal types were tested, i.e., bituminous, anthracite, and semi-coke coals.

In total, the chemical composition of major organic species are non-aromatic hydrocarbons, carboxylic acids and aromatic compounds. The emission of organic particles showed distinct characteristics in terms of four stages, i.e., the heating and ignition stage, fiercely combustion stage, stable combustion stage, and ember combustion stage. Non-aromatic hydrocarbons and aromatic compounds are the dominant compounds of organics, with the fraction of these two components more than 90%. While carboxylic acids dominated the organics during fiercely combustion stage and stable combustion stage, two complete combustion stages. During these two stages, a significant ion peak of m/z 73 from organic acids were observed in ACSM, while this ion peak was previously considered the characteristic fragment ion of levoglucosan and used in source apportionment to identify biomass burning OA. Our results will improve our understanding of potential pollution control measures for residential coal combustion and source apportionment for ambient OA.