Abstract
Dust levels around the Tema industrial area of the Greater Accra Region have seen no reduction in recent years. Even though at some periods in time a natural drop in dust pollution levels is assured, the overall variation characteristics of the concentration of PM2.5, PM10, and Total Suspended Particles (TSP) have not been studied in recent years. This paper examines the levels of dust pollution across four (4) locations within the Tema metropolitan area with a specific interest in selecting locations and periods (weeks) significantly affected by dust pollution within the study area. Data collection was done over a nine-month period using the Casella 712 Microdust Pro Kit equipment. Measurements were done day and night at sampling points about 100 m apart in a given location. Monitoring was conducted once a week during the day and at night with a sampling period of 24 h per location, for thirty-six weeks. The generalized linear models were explored in selecting locations and weeks significantly affected by dust pollution. The study results showed no significant difference between pollution levels across the four selected locations. Eight, eleven, and five weeks out of the 36 weeks recorded significantly high concentrations of PM2.5, PM10, and TSP respectively. In addition, two out of the selected four areas (the oil jetty area and the VALCO hospital area) were found to have significantly high concentrations of dust pollution. The study recommends that an urgent air quality control policy intervention be put in place to control the highly alarming levels of dust pollution concentrations to guarantee and protect human health within the study area and beyond.
Highlights
40% of the world’s premature deaths per year are caused by long-term exposure to polluted air [1]
Per the IFC guidelines [29,30], an average weekly PM2.5 concentrations value ≤ 25 μg/m3 is acceptable while an average weekly PM2.5 value ≤ 35 μg/m3 is acceptable for the Ghana standards [28]
The IFC guidelines [29,30] put the acceptable limit at a weekly average of PM10 ≤ 50 μg/m3 while an average weekly PM10 value ≤ 70 μg/m3 is the acceptable limit by the Ghana standards [28]
Summary
40% of the world’s premature deaths per year are caused by long-term exposure to polluted air [1]. Anthropogenic [3] and developmental activities such as construction, manufacturing, transportation, and production, primarily intended to increase efficiency and modernity, contribute a lot to the pollution we see in our societies and the world [4]. These activities produce an enormous amount of waste and emissions that leads to depletion of the ozone layer, global warming, diseases, and death in some extreme cases. Excavation works, backfilling operations, stockpiling of waste filling trenches with sand, vehicular movement over the cleared work area, and transportation of materials all contribute to air emissions and dust particles that affect air quality. Tomareva et al [7] referred to pipelines as being complex technogenic systems and mentioned that due to the linear arrangement of pipelines, many natural and climatic zones with various geological and hydrological conditions are affected by the anthropogenic impact
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