Effect of Atmospheric Haze on the Deterioration of Visibility over the Pearl River Delta

Abstract: The studies on the effect of atmospheric aerosol on climate and environment are hot issues in the current circle of international science and technology. In recent years the pollution of aerosol is getting worse and worse over the Pearl River Delta. The clouds of aerosol occur all year round, with heavy pollution area located at the western side at the mouth of Pearl River. The haze weather mainly occurs from October to April next year, resulting in visibility deterioration. From the beginning of 1980s, visibility dramatically deteriorated, obviously increasing haze weather, in which there are three big fluctuations, showing the periods of pollutions of dust, sulphate and dust,fine particle from photochemical process and sulphate and dust accompanying with the development of economy respectively. The long-term tendency of visibility caused by fog and light fog does not show a tendency due to human activities or economic development, which mainly shows the interannual and interdecadal variation of climate. The deterioration of visibility has close relation to the fine particles over Pearl River Delta, with half of PM10 overpass the limited value set by national second graded standard (150 μg m-3), meanwhile, all values of PM2.5 overpass the day-mean limited value of American national standard (65 μg m-3), especially from October to January next year, monthly mean values of PM2.5 almost reach two times of standard value, indicating the fine particle concentration is very high. The ratio of PM2.5 to PM10 is also very high, reaching 58%-77%, higher especially in dry season than in rainy season. Thus it is the fine particle pollution in aerosol pollution over the Pearl River Delta.Compared with the data of 15 years ago, the ratio of ne particle to aerosol has obviously increased.

Key words: 
• Pearl River Delta, aerosol cloud, brownish haze, visibility deterioration