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Improvement of health risk factors after reduction of VOC concentrations in industrial and urban areas

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Abstract

After reductions of fugitive and diffuse emissions by an industrial complex, a follow-up study was performed to determine the time variability of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and the lifetime cancer risk (LCR). Passive samplers (3 M monitors) were placed outdoors (n = 179) and indoors (n = 75) in industrial, urban, and control areas for 4 weeks. Twenty-five compounds including n-alkanes, cycloalkanes, aromatics, chlorinated hydrocarbons, and terpenes were determined by GC/MS. The results show a significant decrease of all VOCs, especially in the industrial area and to a lesser extent in the urban area. The median outdoor concentration of benzene in the industrial area declined compared to the former study, around 85 % and about 50 % in the urban area, which in the past was strongly influenced by industrial emissions. Other carcinogenic compounds like styrene and tetrachloroethylene were reduced to approximately 60 %. VOC concentrations in control areas remained nearly unchanged. According to the determined BTEX ratios and interspecies correlations, in contrast to the previous study, traffic was identified as the main emission source in the urban and control areas and showed an increased influence in the industrial area. The LCR, calculated for benzene, styrene, and tetrachloroethylene, shows a decrease of one order of magnitude in accordance to the decreased total VOC concentrations and is now acceptable according to values proposed by the World Health Organization.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank the International Cooperation Programme of the International Bureau (IB) of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Ministry of Science and Technology of Argentina (MINCyT) (contract no. ARG 10/21) for the facility of exchange between researchers of both countries. The authors also would like to thank the Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET) and the Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas de la Provincia de Buenos Aires (CIC-PBA) for financing the present study. A. Porta is a member of the research career of CIC-PBA, and JE Colman Lerner and EY Sánchez are doctoral fellows of CONICET. The authors thank Brigitte Winkler for her excellent technical assistance.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare they have no actual or potential competing financial interests.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas, CIMA-Centro de Investigaciones del Medio Ambiente, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, La Plata, Argentina

    Jorge Esteban Colman Lerner, Myriam Elisabeth Aguilar, Laura Andrea Massolo, Erica Yanina Sánchez & Atilio Andrés Porta

  2. Department of Proteomics, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Leipzig, Germany

    Andrea Mueller

  3. Department of Monitoring and Exploration Technologies, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Leipzig, Germany

    Tibor Kohajda

  4. Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo en Ciencias Aplicadas “Dr. Jorge J. Ronco” CONICET CCT, Universidad de La Plata, La Plata, Argentina

    Jorge Esteban Colman Lerner

  5. Laboratorio de Ingeniería Sanitaria, Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad de La Plata, La Plata, Argentina

    Atilio Andrés Porta

  6. Department of Environmental Medicine and Hygiene, University of Leipzig, Faculty of Medicine, Leipzig, Germany

    Philipp Opitz & Olf Herbarth

  7. Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

    Gunnar Wichmann

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  1. Jorge Esteban Colman Lerner
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  2. Tibor Kohajda
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  3. Myriam Elisabeth Aguilar
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  4. Laura Andrea Massolo
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  5. Erica Yanina Sánchez
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  6. Atilio Andrés Porta
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  7. Philipp Opitz
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  8. Gunnar Wichmann
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  9. Olf Herbarth
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  10. Andrea Mueller
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Correspondence to Andrea Mueller.

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Responsible editor: Gerhard Lammel

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Lerner, J.E.C., Kohajda, T., Aguilar, M.E. et al. Improvement of health risk factors after reduction of VOC concentrations in industrial and urban areas. Environ Sci Pollut Res 21, 9676–9688 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-014-2904-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-014-2904-x

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