Sq. Turn et al., ELEMENTAL CHARACTERIZATION OF PARTICULATE MATTER EMITTED FROM BIOMASSBURNING - WIND-TUNNEL DERIVED SOURCE PROFILES FOR HERBACEOUS AND WOODFUELS, JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-ATMOSPHERES, 102(D3), 1997, pp. 3683-3699
Particulate matter emitted from wind tunnel simulations of biomass bur
ning for five herbaceous crop residues (rice, wheat and barley straws,
corn stover and sugar cane trash) and four wood fuels (walnut and alm
ond prunings and ponderosa pine and Douglas fir slash) was collected a
nd analyzed for major elements and water soluble species. Primary cons
tituents of the particulate matter were C, K, Cl, and S. Carbon accoun
ted for roughly 50% of the herbaceous fuel PM and about 70% for the wo
od fuels. For the herbaceous fuels, particulate matter from rice straw
in the size range below 10 mu m aerodynamic diameter (PM10) had the h
ighest concentrations of both K (24%) and Cl, (17%) and barley straw P
M10 contained the highest sulfur content (4%). K, Cl, and S were prese
nt in the PM of the wood fuels at reduced levels with maximum concentr
ations of 6.5% (almond prunings), 3% (walnut prunings), and 2% (almond
prunings), respectively. Analysis of water soluble species indicated
that ionic forms of K, Cl, and S made up the majority of these element
s from all fuels. Element balances showed K, Cl, S, and N to have the
highest recovery factors (fraction of fuel element found in the partic
ulate matter) in the PM of the elements analyzed. In general, chlorine
was the most efficiently recovered element for the herbaceous fuels (
10 to 35%), whereas sulfur recovery was greatest for the wood fuels (2
5 to 45%), Unique potassium to elemental carbon ratios of 0.20 and 0.9
5 were computed for particulate matter (PM10 K/C(e)) from herbaceous a
nd wood fuels, respectively. Similarly, in the size class below 2.5 mu
m, high-temperature elemental carbon to bromine (PM2.5 C(eht)/Br) rat
ios of similar to 7.5, 43, and 150 were found for the herbaceous fuels
, orchard prunings, and forest slash, respectively. The molar ratios o
f particulate phase bromine to gas phase CO2 (PM10 Br/CO2) are of the
same order of magnitude as gas phase CH3Br/CO2 reported by others.