Comparison of Submicron Particles at a Rural and an Urban Site in the North China Plain during the December 2016 Heavy Pollution Episodes

Xiaojing SHEN; Junying SUN; Xiaoye ZHANG; Yangmei ZHANG; Yaqiang WANG; Kaiyan TAN; Peng WANG; Lu ZHANG; Xuefei QI; Haochi CHE; Zhouxiang ZHANG; Junting ZHONG; Huarong ZHAO; Sanxue REN

doi:10.1007/s13351-018-7060-7

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Comparison of Submicron Particles at a Rural and an Urban Site in the North China Plain during the December 2016 Heavy Pollution Episodes

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Corresponding author: Junying SUN, jysun@cma.gov.cn;

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Supported by the National Key Project of Ministry of Science and Technology of China (2016YFC0203306 and 2016YFC0203305) and Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences Basic Research Fund (2017Z011, 2016Z001, and 2016Y004)

DOI: 10.1007/s13351-018-7060-7

Abstract

Abstract

An extensive field experiment for measurement of physical and chemical properties of aerosols was conducted at an urban site in the Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences (CAMS) in Beijing and at a rural site in Gucheng (GC), Hebei Province in December 2016. This paper compares the number size distribution of submicron particle matter (PM1, diameter < 1 μm) between the two sites. The results show that the mean PM1 number concentration at GC was twice that at CAMS, and the mass concentration was three times the amount at CAMS. It is found that the accumulation mode (100–850 nm) particles constituted the largest fraction of PM1 at GC, which was significantly correlated with the local coal combustion, as confirmed by a significant relationship between the accumulation mode and the absorption coefficient of soot particles. The high PM1 concentration at GC prevented the occurrence of new particle formation (NPF) events, while eight such events were observed at CAMS. During the NPF events, the mass fraction of sulfate increased significantly, indicating that sulfate played an important role in NPF. The contribution of regional transport to PM1 mass concentration was approximately 50% at both sites, same as that of the local emission. However, during the red-alert period when emission control took place, the contribution of regional transport was notably higher.

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Fig. 1. Location of the measurement sites: (a) CAMS in Beijing city and GC in Hebei Province and (b) the national roads as well as highways in this region. The map is from Google Earth.

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Fig. 2. (a, b) Wind speed and wind direction, and (c, d) air temperature (Temp; dashed line) and relative humidity (RH; solid line) at (a, c) the CAMS site and (b, d) the GC site in December 2016. The color of dots in (a, b) indicates the wind direction from 0 to 360 degree.

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Fig. 3. Particle number size distribution (PNSD) at (a) CAMS and (b) GC in December 2016. The purple line indicates the geometric mean diameter of PNSD at each site.

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Fig. 4. Time series of hourly mean PM1 mass concentration calculated based on PNSD at CAMS (dashed line) and GC (solid line), respectively.

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Fig. 5. Comparison of mean PNSD between CAMS and GC. The bars indicate standard deviation.

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Fig. 6. Hourly mean number concentration of different modes: (a) nucleation mode, (b) Aitken mode, (c) accumulation mode, and (d) total particles at CAMS (dashed line) and GC (solid line).

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Fig. 7. Diurnal patterns of hourly mean number concentration (N, cm^–3) of (a) nucleation mode, (b) Aitken mode, and (c) accumulation mode at CAMS (dashed line, left axis) and GC (solid line, right axis).

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Fig. 8. Comparison of absorption coefficient (σ_{abs, 637}) vs. number concentration of (a) Aitken mode and (b) accumulation mode particles.

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Fig. 9. An NPF case with a long-lasting growth process that occurred at 1200 BT during 8–13 December 2016 at CAMS. (a) PNSD evolution, (b) number concentration of each mode, and (c) calculated PM1 mass concentration. The purple dots in (a) indicates the geometric mean dia-meter of PNSD.

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Fig. 10. 72-h back trajectories arriving at CAMS during 8–13 December. The red, black, and blue lines represent the trajectories on 8–10, 11, and 12–13 December, respectively.

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Fig. 11. Mass fraction of the chemical species of the non-refractory submicron particles, including organics, sulfate, nitrate, and ammonium on the left axis and nucleation mode concentration on the right axis. The dashed-line gray boxes indicate the NPF events.

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Fig. 12. Hourly mean value of PM1 during 8–21 December at CAMS and GC, respectively. The daily minima were chosen as the baseline for case 1 and case 2, marked by lower dashed lines.

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Table 1 Modal fitting results of the mean particle number size distribution at CAMS and GC during the experiment. D_{p, g, i} is the mode geometric mean diameter, σ_{g, i} is the mode variance, N_i is the mode number concentration, and i is the mode number

	Mode 1			Mode 2
	D_{p, g, 1} (nm)	σ_{g, 1}	N₁ (cm^–3)	D_{p, g, 2} (nm)	σ_{g, 2}	N₂ (cm^–3)
CAMS	61±38	2.00±0.70	12,500±4330	310±60	1.63±0.33	1530±4330
GC	120±32	1.97±0.10	25,810±10,190	320±29	1.80±0.34	1180±2150

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Shen, X. J., J. Y. Sun, X. Y. Zhang, et al., 2018: Comparison of submicron particles at a rural and an urban site in the North China Plain during the December 2016 heavy pollution episodes . J. Meteor. Res., 32(1), 26–37, doi: 10.1007/s13351-018-7060-7..

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Manuscript History

Received: 11 June 2017

Accepted: 14 October 2017

Final form: 31 January 2018

Published online: 09 February 2018

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Comparison of Submicron Particles at a Rural and an Urban Site in the North China Plain during the December 2016 Heavy Pollution Episodes