Assessment of Persistent Organic Pollutant in the atmosphere of Latin America

MIGLIORANZA K.S.B.; GONZALEZ M; ONDARZA P.M.; MITTON F.; BARRA R.; FILLMANN G.

Berlín

Congreso; 6th SETAC World Congress/SETAC Europe 22nd Annual Meeting; 2012

Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) Europe Office

The widespread use and distribution of pesticides, industrial and urban chemicals and the consequent release into the environment, is of great worldwide relevance. Atmospheric transport is responsible for pollutant dispersal over long distances. As part of an atmospheric regional network, a monitoring program involving the use of pine needles, epiphytes and passive samplers is conducted. Pine needles (Pinus sp.) can accumulate hydrophobic compounds such as organochlorine pesticides (OCPs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and polybrominated diphenyls ethers (PBDEs), from air. Moreover, they integrate contaminants loads over a long time. All these compounds, included in the Stockholm Convention, are of concern due to their distribution, global transport and toxicity. Pine needles were used to evaluate latitudinal and longitudinal transport of contaminants in central and Patagonian regions from Argentina, with a 20 stations network. The epiphyte Tillandsia bergerii was used to evaluate local sources at small scale, setting 7 transplanting points including urban, periurban and rural land uses. Passive samplers (XAD-2) constitute the aim of our Latin American Atmospheric Passive Sampling Network (LAPAN) where 46 sites are actually covered while 80 sites are at least our endeavor to reach. The network involves regions of Antarctica and 12 countries including urban, agricultural and industrial areas. Analyses are performed by GC-ECD and GC-MS. Pine needles analyses revealed that among OCPs, the currently used endosulfans, are the main pesticides found, particularly associated with agricultural areas, however DDE, the DDT metabolite, is also found in all sites independently of particular sources, as a consequence of their intensive past use in the region. Regarding PCBs, a predominance of #110, 118, 153, 138 is found, related with punctual sources. Considering the latitudinal gradient, until the southeast region of Argentina, an increasing in DDT, PCBs and PBDEs (BDE-28 and 47) is observed inferring an atmospheric transport of these compounds. PBDEs and PCBs levels in T. bergerii showed a concentric distribution around the urban settlement with a clear hot spot near a waste disposition site, that is accomplished by the presence of PBDEs 28, 47, 99 and 100 and PCBs 153, 138, 110 and 118. In all industrial or urban sites the relation PBDEs/PCBs >1 reflect the general trend of diminishing PCBs levels and increasing the emergent PBDEs.