AAAR 35th Annual Conference October 17 - October 21, 2016 Oregon Convention Center Portland, Oregon, USA
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Molecular Composition of Biomass Burning Aerosol from Household Cookstoves in Rural Haryana, India
Lauren Fleming, SERGEY NIZKORODOV, Donald Blake, Robert Weltman, Rufus Edwards, Peng Lin, Alexander Laskin, Julia Laskin, Kirk Smith, Narendra Arora, Sneha Gautam, Ankit Yadav, University of California, Irvine
Abstract Number: 230 Working Group: Carbonaceous Aerosols in the Atmosphere
Abstract Emissions of air pollutants from biomass-burning cookstoves in India have proven to be significant on regional scales. However, the extent of competition between the primary particle evaporation, which reduces the PM2.5 mass, and chemical oxidation of VOC components in smoke, which increases the PM2.5 mass by forming secondary pollutants, is poorly understood. To better constrain the contribution of primary and secondary aerosols to the aged cookstove smoke, we collected particulate matter and whole air samples from prescribed cooking activities using traditional cookstoves in Palwal District, Haryana, India. The fuel sources included brushwood and dung. The whole air samples were analyzed using gas chromatography methods to determine the distribution of non-methane volatile organic compounds in fresh smoke. The molecular composition of the particulate organic compounds was characterized using nanospray desorption electrospray ionization (nano-DESI) high-resolution mass spectrometry. Nitrogen-containing compounds were found to dominate the nano-DESI-MS signal in dung smoke samples, while the majority of detected compounds from brushwood smoke did not contain nitrogen. The results of this study will be used as an input to a model that describes secondary chemical processing of smoke, and will serve as basis for determining the effect of replacement of traditional cookstoves with more modern alternatives.