CNR ISAC Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, National Research Council, ISAC-CNR sp Lecce-Monteroni km 12, 73100 Lecce, Italy.
Environ Monit Assess. 2013 Feb;185(2):1719-35. doi: 10.1007/s10661-012-2663-4. Epub 2012 May 16.
Epidemiological studies typically use monitored air pollution data from a single station or as averaged data from several stations to estimate population exposure. In industrialized urban areas, this approach may present critical issues due to the spatial complexities of air pollutants which are emitted by different sources. This study focused on the city of Taranto, which is one of the most highly industrialized cities in southern Italy. Epidemiological studies have revealed several critical situations in this area, in terms of mortality excess and short-term health effects of air pollution. The aims of this paper are to study the variability of air pollutants in the city of Taranto and to interpret the results in relation to the applicability of the data in assessing population exposure. Meteorological and pollution data (SO2, NO2, PM10), measured simultaneously and continuously during the period 2006-2010 in five air quality stations, were analyzed. Relative and absolute spatial concentration variations were investigated by means of statistical indexes. Results show significant differences among stations. The highest correlation between stations was observed for PM10 concentrations, while critical values were found for NO2. The worst values were observed for the SO2 series. The high values of 90th percentile of differences between pairs of monitoring sites for the three pollutants index suggest that mean concentrations differ by large amounts from site to site. The overall analysis supports the hypothesis that various parts of the city are differently affected by the different emission sources, depending on meteorological conditions. In particular, analysis revealed that the influence of the industrial site may be primarily identified with the series of SO2 data which exhibit higher mean concentration values and positive correlations with wind intensity when the monitoring station is downwind from the industrial site. Results suggest evaluating the population exposure to air pollutants in industrialized cities by taking into account the possible zones of influence of different emission sources. More research is needed to identify an indicator, which ought to be a synthesis of several pollutants, and take into account the meteorological variables.
流行病学研究通常使用单个站点监测的空气污染数据或来自多个站点的平均值数据来估计人群暴露。在工业化城市地区，由于不同来源排放的空气污染物具有空间复杂性，因此这种方法可能会带来严重的问题。本研究集中于意大利南部工业化程度最高的城市之一塔兰托。流行病学研究揭示了该地区在死亡率过高和空气污染短期健康影响方面的几种危急情况。本文的目的是研究塔兰托市空气污染物的可变性，并根据数据在评估人群暴露方面的适用性来解释结果。分析了 2006-2010 年期间在五个空气质量监测站同时连续测量的气象和污染数据（SO2、NO2、PM10）。通过统计指标研究了相对和绝对空间浓度变化。结果表明各站点之间存在显著差异。在 PM10 浓度方面，站点之间的相关性最高，而在 NO2 方面则发现了临界值。SO2 系列的结果最差。三个污染物指数中两两监测站点之间差异的第 90 百分位数的高值表明，站点之间的平均浓度差异很大。总体分析支持以下假设：根据气象条件，城市的不同部分会受到不同排放源的不同影响。特别是，分析表明，工业站点的影响可以主要通过 SO2 数据系列来识别，当监测站位于工业站点的下风时，这些数据系列表现出较高的平均浓度值和与风速强度的正相关关系。结果表明，在工业化城市中评估人群对空气污染物的暴露情况时，应考虑不同排放源的可能影响区域。需要进行更多的研究以确定一个指标，该指标应该是多种污染物的综合，并考虑气象变量。
