EMISSIONS OF VOLATILE AND SEMIVOLATILE ORGANIC-COMPOUNDS AND PARTICULATE MATTER FROM HOT ASPHALTS

Asphalts are widely used in paving of roads, and water-proof sealing o f building roofs, tanks and containers. This study evaluated the quali tative and quantitative characteristics of emissions from hot asphalts and bitumen that included reactive organic gases (ROGs) and particula te matter (PM). The ROGs consisted of several volatile organic compoun ds (VOCs), and semi-volatile organic compounds (SVOCs) of environmenta l concern. The latter included several polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbo ns (PAHs) and alkanes. An experimental laboratory testing, sampling an d analysis protocol was developed for obtaining efficient and cost eff ective a priori estimates of asphalt emissions. The investigation iden tified and quantified the emissions of organics and evaluated the magn itudes as well as particle size distributions of PM emissions. The stu dy demonstrated that the asphalt type and temperature greatly affected the emission characteristics, and that several organic compounds emit ted were partitioned between gaseous and particulate phases. The facto rs that affected the phase distribution of organic compounds included the following: vapor pressures, ambient temperatures, collection metho ds, stability and reactivity, and affinity for sorption on PM.