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RECORD NUMBER: 14 OF 19

Main Title Optimization of Thermal-Optical Analysis for the Measurement of Black Carbon in Regional PM2.5: A Chemometric Approach.
Author Conny, J. M. ;
CORP Author National Inst. of Standards and Technology (CSTL), Gaithersburg, MD. Surface and Microanalysis Science Div.;Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC. Office of Research and Development.
Publisher Aug 2007
Year Published 2007
Report Number EPA/600/R-07/119; EPA-DW-13939973; NERL-RTP-HEASD-07-084;
Stock Number PB2007-114771
Additional Subjects Air pollution abatement ; Atmospheric particulate matter ; Health ; Visibility ; Regional climate ; Adverse effects ; Particulate matter (PM)
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NTIS  PB2007-114771 Some EPA libraries have a fiche copy filed under the call number shown. 07/26/2022
Collation 98p
Abstract
The effect of atmospheric particulate matter (PM) on health, visibility, and regional climate has become a major concern worldwide, and control of PM is now the major challenge in air pollution abatement. Many of the adverse effects are directly associated with the aerosol products of incomplete combustion, which include in large part the refractory carbon component know as elemental carbon (EC). Unfortunately, the complex organic and inorganic nature of PM can lead to severe measurement inconsistencies, and this is particularly the case for EC. Numerous methods have been developed over the last few decades to measure refractory carbon in PM, including methods based on chemical oxidation, thermal oxidation, optical behavior alone, photoacoustic behavior, and thermal oxidation combined with optical behavior. A number of intercomparison studies have revealed that while measurements of total PM carbon are fairly consistent among different methods, EC measurements are not. These inconsistencies in EC are attributed mainly to the belief that different methods measure different mixtures of substances as EC. Thermal oxidation and wet oxidation methods in particular often disagree substantially with optical methods. However, owing to the chemical and physical complexity of refractory carbon in PM, it is not reasonable to expect that the mass of refractory carbon by non-optical oxidative methods should be equivalent to the mass of light-absorbing carbon by optical methods. The goal here was to derive optimal temperatures and durations for the critical steps in the thermal protocol.