A Mathematical Approach to Selective Scavenging of the Different Classes of Typical Atmospheric Aerosols by Rainout and Health Impact

Abstract

In this work, initially a general mathematical framework for wet deposition processes is developed and followed by an in-depth discussion of the scavenging of material below cloud due to rain. These processes are then integrated into an overall framework focussing mainly on precipitation scavenging by rain. This work studies the scavenging efficiencies of aerosol particles within a given rain regime as a function of time by below-cloud scavenging. The health impact of aerosol before and after rain is also considered by comparing the respirable dust fractions. The well-known equations of below-cloud scavenging are applied to eight different classes of atmospheric aerosols (marine background (MB), clean continental background (CCB), average background (AB), background and aged urban plume (BAUP), background and local sources (BLS), urban average (UA), urban and freeway (UF) and central power plant (CCP)) in two precipitation regimes (drizzle and heavy rain) with one drop size distribution (DSD). From this study it is inferred that respirable dust is scavenged with relative ease by rainout. Compared with the volume of respirable aerosol average urban environment (UA) before rain roughly 5.2% remains after 18 hours of drizzle and 4% after 18 hours of heavy rain. Over a long timescale, the results show that heavy rain is more efficient than drizzle in particle scavenging.