Abstract
Atmospheric PM2.5-bound metals are a globally recognized environmental concern that poses a great threat to regional ecosystem health. Determining their ecological risk and sources is imperative for devising effective control strategies. However, little is known about source apportionment of ecological risk of heavy metals bounded to PM2.5. We aimed to quantify the source-specific ecological risk of PM2.5-bound heavy metals from a regional perspective. From December 2014 through July 2016, 23 types of PM2.5-bound metals were measured at nine cities in the Pearl River Delta (PRD), China, one of the most economically dynamic regions in the world. An integrated approach incorporating a receptor model and an ecological risk assessment method was developed to evaluate the source contribution to ecological risk from PM2.5-bound metals. We quantified the ecological risk of six potentially toxic metals (Cd, Pb, Cu, As, Zn, Cr); their total potential ecological risk index (PERI) in the PRD was 1107.81, indicating extremely high ecological risk. The high potential ecological risk was mainly due to Cd. Higher ecological risks arose from industrial and vehicle emissions, followed by coal burning, dust emissions, and heavy oil burning. This study provides evidence that atmospheric Cd at levels lower than the World Health Organization standard can still pose a serious ecological risk and highlights the importance of vehicle non-exhaust emissions in ecological risk caused by air-borne metals, providing new insight into the control strategy for PM2.5.
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Data Availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available from Guangdong Ecological and Environmental Monitoring Center but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study and so are not publicly available. Data are however available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission of Guangdong Ecological and Environmental Monitoring Center.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant number 91743109) and the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (Grant number 2022A1515011522).
Funding
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant number 91743109) and the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (Grant number 2022A1515011522).
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WL participated in the conceptualization, methodology, writing of the original draft, writing, reviewing, & editing of the manuscript, funding acquisition, and project administration. HZ participated in the conceptualization, software, and writing of the original draft. YL participated in the software and writing—review & editing. SZ participated in the validation and writing, reviewing, & editing of the manuscript. QW participated in the visualization and writing, reviewing, & editing of the manuscript. SF participated in the formal analysis and data curation. DM participated in the formal analysis. LY participated in the investigation and data curation. QW participated in the resources. DY participated in the supervision, investigation, methodology, and writing, reviewing, & editing of the manuscript. QH participated in the supervision and writing, reviewing, & editing of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Lin, W., Zhang, H., Lai, Y. et al. Source-Specific Ecological Risk of Atmospheric PM2.5-Bound Metals and Implications for Air Pollution Control: A Regional Perspective from China. Expo Health (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12403-023-00589-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12403-023-00589-2