Spatial distribution of residential wood combustion emissions in the Nordic countries: How well national inventories represent local emissions?

Ville-Veikko Paunu,Niko Karvosenoja,David Segersson,Susana López-Aparicio,Ole-Kenneth Nielsen,Marlene Schmidt Plejdrup,Throstur Thorsteinsson,Jarkko V Niemi,Dam Thanh Vo,Hugo A.C Denier Van Der Gon,Jørgen Brandt,Camilla Geels

doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2021.118712

Abstract

Residential wood combustion (RWC) is a major source of air pollutants in the Nordic and many other countries. The emissions of the pollutants have been estimated with inventories on several scopes, e.g. local and national. An important aspect of the inventories is the spatial distribution of the emissions, as it has an effect on health impact assessments. In this study, we present a novel residential wood combustion emission inventory for the Nordic countries based on national inventories and new gridding of the emissions. We compare the emissions of the Nordic inventory, and especially their spatial distribution, to local assessments and European level TNO-newRWC-inventory to assess the spatial proxies used. Common proxies used in the national inventories in the Nordic countries were building data on locations and primary heating methods and questionnaire-based wood use estimates for appliances or primary heating methods. Chimney sweeper register data was identified as good proxy data, but such data may not be available in an applicable format. Comparisons of national inventories to local assessments showed the possibility to achieve similar spatial distributions through nation-wide methods as local ones. However, this won't guarantee that the emissions are similar. Comparison to the TNO-newRWC-inventory revealed the importance of how differences between urban and rural residential wood combustion are handled. The comparison also highlighted the importance of local characteristics of residential wood combustion in the spatial distribution of emissions.

Highlights

Residential wood combustion (RWC) is common in Europe (Cinci nelli et al, 2019), Asia (Huy et al, 2021; Zhang et al, 2021) and else where (Winijkul et al, 2016)
We present a novel residential wood combustion emission inventory for the Nordic countries based on national inventories and new gridding of the emissions
Residential combustion comprised about half of the total anthropogenic PM2.5 emissions in the Nordic countries in 2014 according to the Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (CLRTAP) na tional submissions,1 and in many cities they have a strong impact on local air quality (Kukkonen et al, 2020)

Summary

Introduction

Residential wood combustion (RWC) is common in Europe (Cinci nelli et al, 2019), Asia (Huy et al, 2021; Zhang et al, 2021) and else where (Winijkul et al, 2016). Correct spatial representation of the emissions is vital in order to limit the uncertainty related to health impact assessments. The spatial resolution itself affects the results of impact assessment as shown in (Karvosenoja et al, 2011; Korhonen et al, 2019; Lehtomaki et al, 2020; Zheng et al, 2017). These studies show that lower spatial resolution often leads to lower air pollution concentration and exposure estimates, since the pollutants are averaged over larger grid cells. An earlier study has shown that non-industrial combustion sources repre sents about 10% of the overall external costs related to health impacts caused by air pollution in Europe (Brandt et al, 2013)

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Conclusion