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Passive sampling of polybrominated diphenyl ethers in indoor and outdoor air in Shanghai, China: seasonal variations, sources, and inhalation exposure

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Abstract

Ninety-seven seasonal, passive indoor and outdoor air samples were collected in Shanghai to study polybrominated diphenyl ethers (ΣPBDEs, 16 congeners including BDE-209), their concentrations, composition profiles, seasonal variations, influencing factors, emission sources, and human inhalation exposure. In summer, median indoor concentrations of Σ 15 PBDEs (excluding BDE-209) were 82 pg m−3 in offices and 30 pg m−3 in homes, ∼3 times the winter concentrations. The average summer concentration of 130 pg m−3 BDE-209 in homes was higher than that in offices (which was 90 pg m−3); in winter, home and office concentrations were similar (46 and 47 pg m−3, respectively). For outdoor air, the median concentration of Σ 15 PBDEs in summer (12 pg m−3) was twice the winter concentration (6 pg m−3), while the summer median concentration of BDE-209 (398 pg m−3) was half the winter concentration (794 pg m−3). Higher concentrations of Σ 15 PBDEs indoors compared with outdoors showed that the lower brominated BDEs found were mainly from indoor sources. Meanwhile, the much lower indoor concentration of BDE-209 compared with the outdoors showed that BDE-209 came mainly from outdoor sources. The data set also indicated that electric/electronic appliances were the main sources of indoor ΣPBDEs, and old appliances emitted more lower brominated BDEs, while industrial emissions should be the main source of the outdoor BDE-209. Median daily human exposures to Σ 15 PBDEs and BDE-209 through inhalation were estimated to be 0.23 and 1.73 ng day−1 in winter and 0.65 and 2.28 ng day−1 in summer for adults. The human inhalation exposure to ΣPBDEs (3.44 ng day−1 for adults and 1.33 ng day−1 for toddlers) was comparable to that from eating contaminated fish for both toddlers and adults in Shanghai.

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Acknowledgments

This study was financially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (41203077, 20877052, 41173097), the Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province, China (2011J05112), the Science and Technology Project of Quanzhou, China (2012Z85), and the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University (IRT13078), for which the authors are grateful. We deeply appreciate the advice and comments given by Prof. Ming Fang and the anonymous reviewers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Environmental and Resources Technology, Department of Environmental Science and Engineering, College of Chemical Engineering, Huaqiao University, Xiamen, 361021, China

    Wenliang Han & Tao Fan

  2. Institute of Environmental Pollution and Health, Shanghai University, Shanghai, 200444, China

    Binhua Xu, Jialiang Feng, Minghong Wu, Yingxin Yu & Jiamo Fu

  3. Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, 510640, China

    Gan Zhang

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  1. Wenliang Han
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  3. Binhua Xu
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Correspondence to Jialiang Feng.

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Han, W., Fan, T., Xu, B. et al. Passive sampling of polybrominated diphenyl ethers in indoor and outdoor air in Shanghai, China: seasonal variations, sources, and inhalation exposure. Environ Sci Pollut Res 23, 5771–5781 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-015-5792-9

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