Assessment of forest fire impacts on carbonaceous aerosols using complementary molecular marker receptor models at two urban locations in California's San Joaquin Valley

Abstract

Two hundred sixty-three fine particulate matter (PM2.5) samples were collected over fourteen months in Fresno and Bakersfield, California. Samples were analyzed for organic carbon (OC), elemental carbon (EC), water soluble organic carbon (WSOC), and 160 organic molecular markers. Chemical Mass Balance (CMB) and Positive Matrix Factorization (PMF) source apportionment models were applied to the results in order to understand monthly and seasonal source contributions to PM2.5 OC. Similar source categories were found from the results of the CMB and PMF models to PM2.5 OC across the sites. Six source categories with reasonably stable profiles, including biomass burning, mobile, food cooking, two different secondary organic aerosols (SOAs) (i.e., winter and summer), and forest fires were investigated. Both the CMB and the PMF models showed a strong seasonality in contributions of some sources, as well as dependence on wind transport for both sites. The overall relative source contributions to OC were 24% CMB wood smoke, 19% CMB mobile sources, 5% PMF food cooking, 2% CMB vegetative detritus, 17% PMF SOA summer, 22% PMF SOA winter, and 12% PMF forest fire. Back-trajectories using the Weather Research and Forecasting model combined with the FLEXible PARTicle dispersion model (WRF-FLEXPART) were used to further characterize wind transport. Clustering of the trajectories revealed dominant wind patterns associated with varying concentrations of the different source categories. The Comprehensive Air Quality Model with eXtensions (CAMx) was used to simulate aerosol transport from forest fires and thus confirm the impacts of individual fires, such as the Rough Fire, at the measurement sites.