title: Quantification of sources of PCBs to the atmosphere in urban areas: a comparison of cities in North America, Western Europe and former Yugoslavia.
abstract: We present estimated emission source strengths of seven polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) congeners for Banja Luka, a city that was affected by the civil war in Bosnia and Hercegovina (former Yugoslavia) in the 1990s. These emission estimates are compared to PCB emission rates estimated for the cities of Zurich, Switzerland, and Chicago, USA using an approach that combines multimedia mass balance modeling and measurement data. Our modeled per-capita emission estimates for Banja Luka are lower by a factor of ten than those for Zurich and Chicago, which are similar. This indicates that the sources of PCB emissions in Banja Luka are likely to be weaker than in the Western European and North American cities which show relatively high PCB emissions. Our emission rates from the three cities agree within a factor of ten with emission estimates from a global PCB emission inventory derived from production and usage estimates and emission factors.
authors: Institute for Chemical and Bioengineering, ETH Zurich, CH-8093 Zurich, Switzerland. bojan.gasic@chem.ethz.ch
authors: Bojan
authors: B
authors: Gasic
authors: Matthew
authors: M
authors: MacLeod
authors: Jana
authors: J
authors: Klanova
authors: Martin
authors: M
authors: Scheringer
authors: Predrag
authors: P
authors: Ilic
authors: Gerhard
authors: G
authors: Lammel
authors: Aleksandar
authors: A
authors: Pajovic
authors: Knut
authors: K
authors: Breivik
authors: Ivan
authors: I
authors: Holoubek
authors: Konrad
authors: K
authors: Hungerbühler
mesh_terms: D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000032:analysis*; D000397:Air Pollution / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D001272:Atmosphere / Q000737:chemistry*; D002947:Cities; D004784:Environmental Monitoring; D005060:Europe; D009010:Monte Carlo Method; D009656:North America; D011078:Polychlorinated Biphenyls / Q000032:analysis*; D015022:Yugoslavia
chemical_list: D000393:Air Pollutants; D011078:Polychlorinated Biphenyls