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Source Apportionment of Total Suspended Particles (TSP) by Positive Matrix Factorization (PMF) and Chemical Mass Balance (CMB) Modeling in Ahvaz, Iran

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Abstract

There is a compelling need for apportionment of pollutants’ sources to facilitate their reduction through proper management plans. The present study was designed to determine the contribution of each possible source of total suspended particles in Ahvaz’s ambient air using positive matrix factorization (PMF), chemical mass balance (CMB), and the SPECIATE database. The sampling program undertaken followed EPA’s guidelines and finally resulted in 74 samples. The concentration of 33 elemental and 10 ionic species were measured during a whole year. Three modeling approaches were applied: PMF, the integrated use of PMF and CMB, and the integrated use of the SPECIATE database and CMB. Six sources were derived by PMF: crustal dust (30.6%), industrial and mining activities (25.4%), motor vehicles (23.4%), marine aerosols (11.5%), secondary inorganic aerosols (5.7%), and road dust (3.4%). The contributions of sources from PMF–CMB approach were crustal dust (32.9%), industrial and mining activities (20.9%), motor vehicles (19.7%), marine aerosols (11.1%), secondary inorganic aerosols (9.2%), and road dust (9.36%). Seven sources were derived by SPECIATE–CMB approach: crustal dust (23.2%), industrial and mining activities (20.1%), motor vehicles (17.5%), marine aerosols (12.4%), secondary inorganic aerosols (4.8%), road dust (5.3%), and “nondetermined sources” factor (16.7%). Despite the different contributions of sources, there is a noticeable consistency between the results of these approaches. Furthermore, because of the approved performance of combined receptor models in previous studies and the presence of sufficient data on the number of species and samples, the results of the PMF–CMB approach are possibly the most realistic among those of the three applied approaches.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Tehran University and Tehran University of Medical Sciences (Research Project Number #9742) and the Institute for Environmental Research (IER) for their financial support of the present study and the Iranian Health Research Center for providing the sampling location.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Environment, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

    Khosro Ashrafi & Reza Fallah

  2. Sabzevar University of Medical Sciences, Sabzevar, Iran

    Mostafa Hadei

  3. Environmental and Occupational Health Center, Ministry of Health and Medical Education, Tehran, Iran

    Marayam Yarahmadi

  4. Environmental and Occupational Hazards Control Research Center, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Abbas Shahsavani

  5. Department of Environmental Health Engineering, School of Public Health, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Abbas Shahsavani

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  1. Khosro Ashrafi
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  2. Reza Fallah
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  4. Marayam Yarahmadi
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  5. Abbas Shahsavani
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Correspondence to Abbas Shahsavani.

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Appendix

Appendix

See Tables 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8.

Table 4 Instrument detection limit of chemical species
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Table 5 Percent of bootstrap factors mapped back to the original PMF factors from the 6-factor PMF solution
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Table 6 Results of DISP analysis
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Table 7 Factor profiles (concentrations of species)
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Table 8 Details of concentrations and uncertainty values of all chemical species
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Ashrafi, K., Fallah, R., Hadei, M. et al. Source Apportionment of Total Suspended Particles (TSP) by Positive Matrix Factorization (PMF) and Chemical Mass Balance (CMB) Modeling in Ahvaz, Iran. Arch Environ Contam Toxicol 75, 278–294 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00244-017-0500-z

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