Study of atmospheric pollution scavenging. Seventeenth progress report

Technical Report · Sun Jul 01 04:00:00 EDT 1979

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/5912849· OSTI ID:5912849

Semonin, R. G.; Bartlett, J.; Gatz, D. F.; Peden, M. E.; Skowron, L. M.; Stensland, G. J.

The continued study of historical precipitation chemistry, air quality, and emissions data shows that the nitrate concentrations in precipitation have increased over the past 20 years with little change in sulfate concentrations. An analysis of aerosol concentrations at MAP3S precipitation collection sites shows consistently higher elemental concentrations at urban Champaign, Illinois, than sites at Whiteface Mountain, New York, and rural Champaign. Scavenging ratios at Whiteface exceeded those obtained previously at St. Louis, Missouri, possibly due to mid-tropospheric long-range transport and differing synoptic situations. Factor analysis of 6 storms during METROMEX shows that different deposition patterns were found for the soluble and insoluble concentrations of the same element. This suggests different scavenging processes may be active for these fractions. Using METROMEX data, no correlation was found between pollutant source strength and the urban-related precipitation anomaly. Four different Nuclepore air filter setups were used to compare air concentrations of sulfate, nitrate, and ammonium. The sulfate comparison was good, but the large variability for nitrate and ammonium raise serious questions on the credibility of measurements using Nuclepore as the collection medium. The details of a case study of wet deposition from SCORE-78 are presented and shows the pollutant concentrations are more variable than the rainfall. A brief description of the progress on the SCORE-79 project is presented. The progress on acid rainfall studies shows that the high pH values in the Midwest in the mid-1950's were due in part to elevated concentrations of calcium and magnesium. A variety of model calculations are presented to show the effects of adjusting past data to currently observed values. Recent results of continuing research on ionic stability of precipitation samples are given.

• Research Organization: Illinois State Water Survey, Urbana (USA)
• DOE Contract Number: EY-76-S-02-1199
• OSTI ID: 5912849
• Report Number(s): COO-1199-58
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

500200* -- Environment
Atmospheric-- Chemicals Monitoring & Transport-- (-1989)
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
ACID RAIN
AEROSOL MONITORING
AEROSOLS
AIR FILTERS
AIR POLLUTION
AIR POLLUTION MONITORS
AIR SAMPLERS
AMMONIUM COMPOUNDS
ATMOSPHERIC PRECIPITATIONS
COLLOIDS
DATA
DATA COMPILATION
DATA FORMS
DISPERSIONS
EQUIPMENT
FILTERS
GRAPHS
GREAT LAKES REGION
ILLINOIS
INFORMATION
LABORATORY EQUIPMENT
MAPS
MID-ATLANTIC REGION
MIDWEST REGION
MISSOURI
MONITORING
NEW YORK
NITRATES
NITROGEN COMPOUNDS
NORTH AMERICA
NUMERICAL DATA
OXYGEN COMPOUNDS
PH VALUE
POLLUTION
POLLUTION CONTROL EQUIPMENT
PRECIPITATION SCAVENGING
RAIN
RURAL AREAS
SAMPLERS
SEPARATION PROCESSES
SOLS
SULFATES
SULFUR COMPOUNDS
TABLES
URBAN AREAS
USA
WASHOUT