Abstract
Daily PM2.5 and water-soluble inorganic ions (NH4+, SO42−, NO3−, Cl−, Ca2+, Na+, K+, Mg2+) were collected at the Hongshan Air Monitoring Station at the China University of Geosciences (Wuhan) (30°31′N, 114°23′E), Wuhan, from 1 January to 30 December 2013. A total of 52 effective PM2.5 samples were collected using medium flow membrane filter samplers, and the anionic and cationic ions were determined by ion chromatography and ICP, respectively. The results showed that the average mass concentration of the eight ions was 40.96 µg/m3, which accounted for 62% of the entire mass concentration. In addition, the order of the ion concentrations was SO42− > NO3− > NH4+ > Cl− >K+ > Ca2+ > Na+ > Mg2+. The secondary inorganic species SO42−, NO3− and NH4+ were the major components of water-soluble ions in PM2.5, with a concentration of 92% of the total ions of PM2.5, and the total concentrations of the three ions in the four seasons in descending order as follows: winter, spring, autumn, and summer. NH4+ had a significant correlation with SO42− and NO3−, and the highest correlation coefficients were 0.943 and 0.923 (in winter), while the minimum coefficients were 0.683 and 0.610 (in summer). The main particles were (NH4)2SO4 and NH4NO3 in PM2.5. The charge of the water-soluble ions was nearly balanced in PM2.5, and the pertinence coefficients of water-soluble anions and cations were more than 0.9. The highest pertinence coefficients were in the spring (0.9887), and the minimum was in summer (0.9459). That is, there were more complicated ions in PM2.5 in the summer. The mean value of NO3−/SO42− was 0.64, indicating that stationary sources of PM2.5 had a greater contribution in Wuhan.
Highlights
With the rapid development of modern industrialization and urbanization and the sustainable growth of energy consumption and the number of motor vehicles, air contamination has gradually become the core constraint of sustainable urban progress and eco-civilization construction in recent decades
This study elucidated the characteristics of PM2.5 in Wuhan city from January to December 2013
The analyses of the obtained results showed that there was a relatively high total mass concentration level of water-soluble ions in PM2.5, and the ions followed a descending order of SO4 2 ́ > NO3 ́ >
Summary
With the rapid development of modern industrialization and urbanization and the sustainable growth of energy consumption and the number of motor vehicles, air contamination has gradually become the core constraint of sustainable urban progress and eco-civilization construction in recent decades. Numerous studies have revealed that the sources, material compositions and formation mechanisms of atmospheric PM2.5 are very complicated [5,6], and PM2.5 mainly contains black carbon [7], elemental carbon [8], crust elements [9,10], water-soluble ions [11,12], microelements [13,14], etc. Among these species, water-soluble ions could account for more than. PM2.5’s constituents are different with the diversities of regional
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