TY - JOUR
T1 - Trans-boundary air pollution in a city under various atmospheric conditions
AU - Luo, Ming
AU - Hou, Xiangting
AU - Gu, Yefu
AU - Lau, Ngar Cheung
AU - Yim, Steve Hung Lam
N1 - Funding Information:
This work is supported by the Improvement on Competitiveness in Hiring New Faculties Fund (2013/14) of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (Grant No. 4930059 ), The Vice-Chancellor's Discretionary Fund of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (grant no. 4930744 ), the Early Career Scheme of Research Grants Council of Hong Kong (grant no. ECS-24301415 ) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 41401052 ). The authors are grateful for the discussion organized by the Institute of Future Cities (IOFC) and the Stanley Ho Big Data Decision Analytics Research Centre at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. In addition, we would also like to thank the HKEPD and the HKO for providing air quality data ( http://epic.epd.gov.hk/EPICDI/air/station/?lang=en ) and meteorological data ( http://www.weather.gov.hk/cis/annex/hkwxstn_e.htm ), respectively, and the technical supports from the Information Technology Services Centre (ITSC) at CUHK.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2018/3/15
Y1 - 2018/3/15
N2 - Trans-boundary air pollution (TAP) is a crucial factor affecting air quality, and its contribution may vary over time and differ under various atmospheric conditions. This study firstly applies an integrated statistical scheme to estimate the contributions of TAP and local sources to air pollutants in a city, and then investigate the influences of tropical cyclones (TC) on TAP. Hong Kong is chosen as an example because of its significant and special TAP characteristics. This study focuses on four major air pollutants, namely, respirable and fine suspended particulates (RSP/PM10 and FSP/PM2.5), sulfur dioxide (SO2), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2), from 2002 to 2013. Our results show that, on average, TAP is the major contributor of the annual RSP, FSP, SO2, and NO2 in Hong Kong. We estimate that when a TC is approaching, the increase in pollutant concentration in Hong Kong is mainly due to the increase in TAP contribution by the strengthened northerly wind at higher level of atmosphere (≥ 900 hPa). These changes are accompanied by decreases in precipitation and increases in northerly/north-easterly wind, which may prolong the lifetime of pollutants, enhancing pollutant transport from mainland China to Hong Kong.
AB - Trans-boundary air pollution (TAP) is a crucial factor affecting air quality, and its contribution may vary over time and differ under various atmospheric conditions. This study firstly applies an integrated statistical scheme to estimate the contributions of TAP and local sources to air pollutants in a city, and then investigate the influences of tropical cyclones (TC) on TAP. Hong Kong is chosen as an example because of its significant and special TAP characteristics. This study focuses on four major air pollutants, namely, respirable and fine suspended particulates (RSP/PM10 and FSP/PM2.5), sulfur dioxide (SO2), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2), from 2002 to 2013. Our results show that, on average, TAP is the major contributor of the annual RSP, FSP, SO2, and NO2 in Hong Kong. We estimate that when a TC is approaching, the increase in pollutant concentration in Hong Kong is mainly due to the increase in TAP contribution by the strengthened northerly wind at higher level of atmosphere (≥ 900 hPa). These changes are accompanied by decreases in precipitation and increases in northerly/north-easterly wind, which may prolong the lifetime of pollutants, enhancing pollutant transport from mainland China to Hong Kong.
KW - Air pollution
KW - Non-negative matrix factorization
KW - Trans-boundary contribution
KW - Tropical cyclones
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U2 - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.11.001
DO - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.11.001
M3 - Article
C2 - 29127869
AN - SCOPUS:85032950077
SN - 0048-9697
VL - 618
SP - 132
EP - 141
JO - Science of the Total Environment
JF - Science of the Total Environment
ER -