Hirai, Y.; Hashimoto, S.; Sakai, S. (2014) Proceedings of International Conference of Asian Environmental Chemistry 2014, pp. 158
Introduction
Persistence of PCB concentrations in air are ascribed to secondary releases from sediments and soil reservoirs, emissions and leakages from in-use PCB products and stored PCB wastes, and unintentional emissions from thermal sources and impurities in pigments1-4. Knowing the relative contribution of these sources to PCB concentrations in air is important in planning an efficient strategy to reduce the risks of PCBs. Nonetheless, only the unintentional thermal sources are included in the national PCB emission inventory prepared for the National Implementation Plan of POPs convention by Japanese government. Thus, we aimed at estimating the relative importance of PCB emission sources in Japan. As a first step, we updated the emission inventory by including the emission from stored PCB wastes and in-use PCB products. Using the updated emission inventory, PCB concentrations in air was estimated by an environmental fate model. The estimated concentrations were compared with the observed concentrations to discuss the contribution of these sources.