Title: Secondary organic aerosol formation from naphthalene roadway emissions in the South Coast Air Basin of California

Authors: Alexander Cohan; Arantzazu Eiguren-Fernandez; Antonio H. Miguel; Donald Dabdub

Addresses: Computational Environmental Sciences Laboratory (CESLAB), Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California, Irvine, CA, 92697, USA; Lake Michigan Air Directors Consortium Organization, Rosemont, IL, 60018, USA ' Institute of the Environment, University of California, 650 Charles E. Young Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA; Aerosols Dynamics, Inc., Berkeley, CA 94710, USA ' Institute of the Environment, University of California, 650 Charles E. Young Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA ' Computational Environmental Sciences Laboratory (CESLAB), Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California, Irvine, CA, 92697, USA

Abstract: Naphthalene is the simplest and most abundant polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) in California fuels, with concentrations of up to 2,600 mg L⁻¹ in gasoline and 1,600 mg L⁻¹ in diesel fuel. In this work, naphthalene emission factors for gasoline and diesel vehicles are combined with an activity-based automobile inventory to characterise anthropogenic naphthalene emissions in the South Coast Air Basin of California (SoCAB). A three-dimensional air quality model is used to examine transport and chemical reaction losses of naphthalene in the SoCAB. Inclusion of naphthalene emissions from on-road gasoline and diesel vehicles was found to increase modelled SOA growth by up to 10%. Hence, reductions of naphthalene from both gasoline and diesel fuels may be an effective means of reducing the emissions of an important SOA-forming precursor to the atmosphere of large urban centres with characteristics similar to the SoCAB. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Keywords: air quality modelling; environmental pollution; air pollution; naphthalene emissions; photochemistry; secondary organic aerosols; SOA; gasoline emissions; petrol emissions; vehicle emissions; diesel emissions; polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons; PAH; California; USA; United States; urban areas.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEP.2013.058461

International Journal of Environment and Pollution, 2013 Vol.52 No.3/4, pp.206 - 224

Received: 12 Apr 2013
Accepted: 18 Oct 2013
Published online: 28 Feb 2014 *

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