Modeling pesticide residues in tobacco leaves for improving life cycle inventory analysis of pesticides in the cigarette industry

Abstract

To promote pesticide management in tobacco products, we conducted a life cycle inventory (LCI) analysis by simulating pesticide residues in tobacco leaves during tobacco farming, manufacturing, and product use stages in the cigarette industry. For the tobacco farming stage, the bioaccumulation-potential analysis of pesticide residues in fresh tobacco leaves indicated that lipophilicity and degradation half-life in soil were two significant factors determining residue mass in leaves. For the manufacturing stage, the persistence analysis of pesticide residues in processed tobacco leaves revealed that pesticides with high volatility or high degradability in plant tissues had small processing factors. For the product use stage, exposure and toxicity assessment of pesticide residues were conducted for tobacco consumed via smoking, which generated characterization factors linking pesticides to impacting human health. According to the LCI analysis, we quantitatively showed that pesticides with low lipophilicity, high degradability, and high volatility limited consumers' exposure to residues via smoking.