Occurrence of polybrominated diphenyl ethers in air and precipitation of the Pearl River Delta, South China: annual washout ratios and depositional rates.

On the basis of a one-year (from October 2006 to September 2007) sampling campaign, 34 air samples and 23 bulk precipitation samples were collected in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) in southern China and analyzed for polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs). Fifteen tri- to deca-BDE congeners (sum of which is defined as Sigma15PBDE) were detected in more than 70% of the samples. In three urban-rural regions, Sigma15PBDE concentrations ranged from 77 to 372 pg/m3 in air (particulate + vapor) and 1.98 to 15.5 ng/L in rain (particle+dissolved) from Dongguan, from 195 to 1450 pg/m3 in air and 4.71 to 17.2 ng/L in rain from Shunde, and from 23.7 to 148 ng/L in rain from Guangzhou. Among the BDE congeners, BDE-209 was the predominant component. Linear correlations between the gas-particle partition coefficients (Kp) and the subcooled vapor pressures (P(O/L)) of individual BDE congeners were observed for both the wet and dry seasons, but the slopes (-0.572 to -0.525) of the fitted equations all substantially deviated from equilibrium condition (slope = -1). The total washout ratio by bulk rainfalls was determined to be 2 x 103 for tri-BDEs and 6 x 104 for BDE-209. The estimated annual dry and wet depositional rates were 6720 and 2460 kg/yr, respectively, for BDE-209, and 7270 and 2940 kg/yr for Sigma15PBDE in the PRD, indicating a dominant pathway for PBDEs input into the PRD soil and aquatic environments.