Assessment of air quality for Kerbala city using field survey

Building and Construction Engineering Department, University of Technology, Baghdad, Iraq

Abstract

The main objectives of this work are monitoring and analyzing air pollutant gases in Karbala city like (O3, SO2, H2S, VOCS, TSP, CO, CO2, NO2, PM1, PM2.5, PM7 and PM10). In this study, 11 deferent locations with 22 monitoring site has been selected to measuring the concentrations of air pollutants. The measuring period was six months starting from December (2015) to May (2016). The concentration results of TSP were more than Iraqi and world standard during April and May. The concentrations of CO recorded high values at the north of the city. The maximum concentration of NO2 was exceeding (1.5 ppm) at April 2016, while the minimum value was reached to (0.1 ppm) in many locations. The values of O3 were within international and Iraqi standard limits while the SO2 concentrations were above the International standard limits. High concentration of CO2 were founded in the north site of Karbala. There were high H2S concentrations in all sites, H2S values were between (0.006 ppm - 1.81 ppm) during the period study, which were exceeding acceptable limits value of the international. There is variation in the volatile organic compounds (VOCs), the highest concentration for VOCs was about (20 ppm) at December 2015. The minimum concentrations of VOCs were recorded during March 2016. In all sites the concentrations were within the acceptable limits (3 ppm). The results of field tests of air sites show that the highest pollutants concentrations were in December, April and May months, whereas lower concentrations of pollutants are observed during the remainder of the study, especially in March.