Evaluation of VOC measurements in the EXPOLIS study

No Thumbnail Available
Authors
Jurvelin, Jouni
Edwards, Rufus
Saarela, Kristina
Laine­-Ylijoki, Jutta
De Bortoli, Maurizio
Schläpfer, Kurt
Georgoulis, Lambros
Tischerova, Eva
Hänninen, Otto
Author (Corporation)
Publication date
2001
Typ of student thesis
Course of study
Type
01A - Journal article
Editors
Editor (Corporation)
Supervisor
Parent work
Journal of Environmental Monitoring
Special issue
DOI of the original publication
Link
Series
Series number
Volume
3
Issue / Number
1
Pages / Duration
159-165
Patent number
Publisher / Publishing institution
Royal Society of Chemistry
Place of publication / Event location
London
Edition
Version
Programming language
Assignee
Practice partner / Client
Abstract
Personal exposures and microenvironment concentrations of 30 target VOCs were measured for 401 participants living in five European cities as a part of the EXPOLIS (Air Pollution Exposure Distributions within Adult Urban Populations in Europe) study. Measurements in Basel used an active charcoal (Carbotech) adsorbent as opposed to the Tenax TA used in the other study centres. In addition, within each centre, personal and microenvironment VOC sampling required different sampling pumps and, because of different sampling durations, different sampling flow rates. Thus, careful testing of the sampling and analysis procedures was required to ensure accuracy and comparability of collected data. Monitor comparison tests using Tenax TA showed a mean VOC concentration ratio of 0.95 between the personal and microenvironment monitors. The LODs for the target VOCs using Tenax TA ranged from 0.7 to 5.2 µg m−3. The LODs for the 14 target compounds quantifiable using Carbotech ranged from 0.9 to 3.2 µg m−3. Tenax TA field blanks showed no remarkable contamination with the target VOCs, except benzaldehyde, a known artefact with this adsorbent. Thus, the diffusion barrier system used prevented contamination of Tenax TA samples by passive diffusion during non-sampling periods. Duplicate and parallel evaluations of the Tenax TA and Carbotech showed an average difference of <17% in VOC concentrations within the sampling methods, but a systematic difference between the methods (Tenax TA ∶ Carbotech concentration ratio = 1.18–2.36). These field evaluations and quality assurance tests showed that interpretation and comparison of the results in any VOC monitoring exercise should be done on a compound by compound basis. It is also apparent that carefully planned and realised QA and QC (QA/QC) procedures are needed in multi-centre studies, where a common sampling method and laboratory analysis technique are not used, to strengthen and simplify the interpretation of observed VOC levels between participating centres.
Keywords
Subject (DDC)
300 - Sozialwissenschaften, Soziologie, Anthropologie
610 - Medizin und Gesundheit
Project
Event
Exhibition start date
Exhibition end date
Conference start date
Conference end date
Date of the last check
ISBN
ISSN
1464-0325
1464-0333
Language
English
Created during FHNW affiliation
No
Strategic action fields FHNW
Publication status
Published
Review
Peer review of the complete publication
Open access category
Closed
License
Citation
JURVELIN, Jouni, Rufus EDWARDS, Kristina SAARELA, Jutta LAINE­-YLIJOKI, Maurizio DE BORTOLI, Lucy BAYER-OGLESBY, Kurt SCHLÄPFER, Lambros GEORGOULIS, Eva TISCHEROVA, Otto HÄNNINEN und Matti JANTUNEN, 2001. Evaluation of VOC measurements in the EXPOLIS study. Journal of Environmental Monitoring. 2001. Bd. 3, Nr. 1, S. 159–165. DOI 10.1039/B007600G. Verfügbar unter: https://irf.fhnw.ch/handle/11654/45834