Effects of Residential Customs on Spatio-Temporal Pollution Characteristics of Fireworks Burning during Chinese New Year

摘要

Burning of fireworks at the Chinese New Year (CNY) is a traditional culture in China, but it may adversely deteriorate air quality, cause fire accident and damage residential health. Numeral studies had proved into this environmental problem on the city scale, it is also important to quantify the spatio-temporal effects of fireworks emissions on air quality and their associations with residential customs during the CNY. Based on the monitored data, we analyzed the characteristics of primary air pollutants caused by fireworks burning, as well as the temporal and spatial variations in the concentrations of particulate matters during the periods of fireworks burning and non-fireworks (one day before CNY's Eve and two days after CNY's Eve). The results indicated that the main air pollutants were particles released from fireworks burning over the whole China, with showing an obvious peak during the CNY of 2015 and 2016. The highest concentrations of particulate matters with size less than 10 mu m (PM10) and 2.5 mu m (PM2.5) were occurred during the early morning at 1:00-3:00 on 19th (2015), reaching 408 mu g/m(3) and 112 mu g/m(3)in Northeast China (NEC), respectively. And the highest values in 2016 were 358 mu g/m(3) and 126 mu g/m(3,) but occurred in North China (NC), respectively. It revealed that the residential customs had significant effects on the temporal distribution of fireworks pollution on the regional scale. The patterns of temporal variations in SO2, NO2 and CO were similar to those of PM10 and PM2.5, but CO was opposite to that of other pollutants. The spatial distributions of particulate pollutants concentrations showed that the most severely polluted regions were located at NEC, East China (EC) and Central China(CC), where had higher population density and gross domestic product (GDP) and local conservative customs. Otherwise, although stricter regulations were implemented in 2016, the concentrations of pollutants were still greater than them in 2015, revealing that meteorological conditions can have a significant effect on mass concentrations of particles. The governments should make control strategies of fireworks burning with comprehensive considering the balance between environmental protection and traditional culture heritage.