Atmospheric lead transport chemical

This figure depicts fate and transport among environmental compartments for a chemical element. Lead, being an element, cannot be destroyed or created in its environmental lifetime, and its relative mobility has little effect on its overall environmental survival. Consequently, significant movements of atmospheric lead to receiving compartments such as soils during past years are stiU relevant for today s lead exposure assessments regardless of marked declines in current air lead emissions and lead deposition to soils. 

Natural mobilization includes chemical, mechanical, and biological weathering and volcanic activity. In chemical weathering, the elements are altered to forms that are more easily transported. For example, when basic rocks are neutralized by acidic fluids (such as rainwater acidified by absorption of CO2), the minerals contained in the rocks can dissolve, releasing metals to aqueous solution. Several examples are listed below of chemical reactions that involve atmospheric gases and that lead to the mobilization of metals ... 

As a rule, simulations consider emissions of heavy metals from anthropogenic and natural sources, transport in the atmosphere and deposition to the underlying surface (Figure 6). It is assumed that lead and cadmium are transported in the atmosphere only as a part of aerosol particles. Besides, chemical transformations of these metals do not change removal properties of their particles-carriers. On the contrary, mercury enters the atmosphere in different physical and chemical forms and undergoes numerous transformations during its pathway in the atmosphere (Ilyn et al., 2002 2004 Ilyin and Travnikov, 2003). 

Contaminant volatilization from subsurface solid and aqueous phases may lead, on the one hand, to pollution of the atmosphere and, on the other hand, to contamination (by vapor transport) of the vadose zone and groundwater. Potential volatihty of a contaminant is related to its inherent vapor pressure, but actual vaporization rates depend on the environmental conditions and other factors that control behavior of chemicals at the solid-gas-water interface. For surface deposits, the actual rate of loss, or the pro-portionahty constant relating vapor pressure to volatilization rates, depends on external conditions (such as turbulence, surface roughness, and wind speed) that affect movement away from the evaporating surface. Close to the evaporating surface, there is relatively little movement of air and the vaporized substance is transported from the surface through the stagnant air layer only by molecular diffusion. The rate of contaminant volatilization from the subsurface is a function of the equilibrium distribution between the gas, water, and solid phases, as related to vapor pressure solubility and adsorption, as well as of the rate of contaminant movement to the soil surface. 

After reaching the subsurface, contaminants are partitioned among the solid, liquid, and gaseous phases. A fraction of the contaminated gaseous phase is transported into the atmosphere, while the remaining part may be adsorbed on the subsurface solid phase or dissolved into the subsurface water. Contaminants dissolved in the subsurface aqueous phase or retained on the subsurface solid phase are subjected, over the course of time, to chemical, biochemical, and surface-induced degradation, which also lead to formation of metabolites. 

Acidification pollutants, nutrients and chemicals being transported via the atmosphere to alpine regions originate from both nearby and far away sources. Deposition mainly occurs on the land surface where they can lead to soil and subsequent water acidification. Nutrients and chemicals are partly released from soil and land surfaces to water depending on their chemical nature, and on land and soil characteristics (cf. [7, 10], this volume). 

Thus, when studying atmospheric chemistry, it is necessary always to take into account the vertical and horizontal movements in the atmosphere, as well as the conditions controlling those chemical reactions that do not spontaneously lead to photochemical equilibrium. These conditions are applicable not only to ozone in the lower stratosphere, but also to atomic oxygen in the upper mesosphere above 75 km. In fact, equation (4) shows that, with increasing height, the formation of O3 becomes less and less important because of the decrease in the concentration of 02 and N2. Above 60 km the concentration of atomic oxygen exceeds that of ozone, but it is still in photochemical equilibrium up to 70 km. However, at the mesospause (85 km), it is subject to atmospheric movements, and its local concentration depends more on transport than on the rate of production. 

With a typical value of Vdp = 0.2 cm s 1 for particles of this size range, the calculated residence time of particles and particle-associated chemicals due to dry deposition in the well-mixed troposphere is 30 days. Modeling of the transport of particle-associated 210Pb leads to an estimated residence time of particles in the atmosphere of 5-15 days due to combined wet and dry deposition (Balkanski et al., 1993), consistent with the above calculations. 

For the majority of gas-phase organic chemicals present in the troposphere, reaction with the OH radical is the dominant loss process (Atkinson, 1995). The tropospheric lifetime of a chemical is the most important factor in determining the relative importance of transport, to both remote regions of the globe and to the stratosphere, and in determining the possible buildup in its atmospheric concentration. Knowledge of the OH radical reaction rate constant for a gas-phase organic compound leads to an upper limit to its tropospheric lifetime. 

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