Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe

Meritxell Garcia-Marlès; Rosa Lara; Cristina Reche; Noemí Pérez; Aurelio Tobías; Marjan Savadkoohi; David Beddows; Imre Salma; Máté Vörösmarty; Tamás Weidinger; Christoph Hueglin; Nikos Mihalopoulos; Georgios Grivas; Panayiotis Kalkavouras; Jakub Ondráček; Nadĕžda Zíková; Jarkko V. Niemi; Hanna E. Manninen; David C. Green; Anja H. Tremper; Michael Norman; Stergios Vratolis; Konstantinos Eleftheriadis; Francisco J. Gómez-Moreno; Elisabeth Alonso-Blanco; Alfred Wiedensohler; Kay Weinhold; Maik Merkel; Susanne Bastian; Barbara Hoffmann; Hicran Altug; Jean Eudes Petit; Olivier Favez; Sebastiao Martins Dos Santos; Jean Philippe Putaud; Adelaide Dinoi; Daniele Contini; Hilkka Timonen; Janne Lampilahti; Tuukka Petäjä; Marco Pandolfi; Philip K. Hopke; Roy M. Harrison; Andrés Alastuey; Xavier Querol

doi:10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510

Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe

Meritxell Garcia-Marlès^*, Rosa Lara, Cristina Reche, Noemí Pérez, Aurelio Tobías, Marjan Savadkoohi, David Beddows, Imre Salma, Máté Vörösmarty, Tamás Weidinger, Christoph Hueglin, Nikos Mihalopoulos, Georgios Grivas, Panayiotis Kalkavouras, Jakub Ondráček, Nadĕžda Zíková, Jarkko V. Niemi, Hanna E. Manninen, David C. Green, Anja H. TremperMichael Norman, Stergios Vratolis, Konstantinos Eleftheriadis, Francisco J. Gómez-Moreno, Elisabeth Alonso-Blanco, Alfred Wiedensohler, Kay Weinhold, Maik Merkel, Susanne Bastian, Barbara Hoffmann, Hicran Altug, Jean Eudes Petit, Olivier Favez, Sebastiao Martins Dos Santos, Jean Philippe Putaud, Adelaide Dinoi, Daniele Contini, Hilkka Timonen, Janne Lampilahti, Tuukka Petäjä, Marco Pandolfi, Philip K. Hopke, Roy M. Harrison, Andrés Alastuey, Xavier Querol^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Earth and Environmental Sciences

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Abstract

Ultrafine particles (UFP, those with diameters ≤ 100 nm), have been reported to potentially penetrate deeply into the respiratory system, translocate through the alveoli, and affect various organs, potentially correlating with increased mortality. The aim of this study is to assess long-term trends (5–11 years) in mostly urban UFP concentrations based on measurements of particle number size distributions (PNSD). Additionally, concentrations of other pollutants and meteorological variables were evaluated to support the interpretations. PNSD datasets from 12 urban background (UB), 5 traffic (TR), 3 suburban background (SUB) and 1 regional background (RB) sites in 15 European cities and 1 in the USA were evaluated. The non-parametric Theil-Sen's method was used to detect monotonic trends. Meta-analyses were carried out to assess the overall trends and those for different environments. The results showed significant decreases in NO, NO₂, BC, CO, and particle concentrations in the Aitken (25–100 nm) and the Accumulation (100–800 nm) modes, suggesting a positive impact of the implementation of EURO 5/V and 6/VI vehicle standards on European air quality. The growing use of Diesel Particle Filters (DPFs) might also have clearly reduced exhaust emissions of BC, PM, and the Aitken and Accumulation mode particles. However, as reported by prior studies, there remains an issue of poor control of Nucleation mode particles (smaller than 25 nm), which are not fully reduced with current DPFs, without emission controls for semi-volatile organic compounds, and might have different origins than road traffic. Thus, contrasting trends for Nucleation mode particles were obtained across the cities studied. This mode also affected the UFP and total PNC trends because of the high proportion of Nucleation mode particles in both concentration ranges. It was also found that the urban temperature increasing trends might have also influenced those of PNC, Nucleation and Aitken modes.

Original language	English
Article number	108510
Number of pages	16
Journal	Environment international
Volume	185
Early online date	17 Feb 2024
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510
Publication status	Published - 9 Mar 2024

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
RI-URBANS (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, contract 101036245) is a European research project, which demonstrates the applications of advanced air quality service tools in urban Europe to improve the assessment of air quality policies, including a better evaluation of health impacts. In this context, this study aims to gather and evaluate available long-term trends of UFP and different particle size modes, based on PNSD data obtained at 21 (mostly urban) sites from 15 urban areas in Europe (11 member states) and one from the USA. A prior RI-URBANS study ( Trechera et al., 2023 ) reported the phenomenology of UFP in urban Europe and compared the 2017–2019 concentrations across different cities and environments. Additional work is ongoing on the source apportionment of PNSD for 23 (mostly urban) sites using receptor modelling tools. In the current study we evaluate and interpret the trend analyses of the above 21 datasets for a period covering up to 11 years (2009–2019). A number of sites cover a shorter period of time, but in all cases, at least the last 5 years of measurement are available. The years 2020–2022 are intentionally excluded to avoid interferences of the COVID19-lockdown effects. To support interpretations, we also evaluate compiled datasets of conventional pollutants (BC, NO 2 , NO, CO, SO 2 , O 3 , PM 10 , PM 2.5 and PM 1 ) and meteorological variables (temperature, T; relative humidity, RH; atmospheric pressure, P; wind speed, WS; solar radiation, RAD; and rain, R) concurrently measured with the PNSDs.

Funding Information:
This study is supported by the RI-URBANS project (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, Green Deal, European Commission, contract 101036245), the “Agencia Estatal de Investigación” from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, FEDER funds under the projects AIRPHONEMA (PID2022-142160OB-I00), and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2021 SGR 00447). This research is partly supported by the Hungarian Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. K132254).

Funding Information:
This study is supported by the RI-URBANS project (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, Green Deal, European Commission, contract 101036245), the “Agencia Estatal de Investigación” from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, FEDER funds under the projects AIRPHONEMA (PID2022-142160OB-I00), and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2021 SGR 00447). This research is partly supported by the Hungarian Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. K132254). We would like to thank also to ACTRIS for providing PNC-PNSD datasets for a number of sites of this study, and National and City authorities for providing others.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Authors

Keywords

Air quality
Ambient air
Nanoparticles
Particle number concentrations

ASJC Scopus subject areas

General Environmental Science

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510Licence: Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND)

Garcia-MarlesM2024Inter-annualFinal published version, 10.2 MBLicence: Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND)

RI-URBANS: Research Infrastructures services reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial areaS
Harrison, R.
European Commission
1/10/21 → 30/09/25
Project: EU

Cite this

Garcia-Marlès, M., Lara, R., Reche, C., Pérez, N., Tobías, A., Savadkoohi, M., Beddows, D., Salma, I., Vörösmarty, M., Weidinger, T., Hueglin, C., Mihalopoulos, N., Grivas, G., Kalkavouras, P., Ondráček, J., Zíková, N., Niemi, J. V., Manninen, H. E., Green, D. C., ... Querol, X. (2024). Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe. Environment international, 185, Article 108510. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510

@article{50ffa00c170345308dd23bdbf1cb5c07,

title = "Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe",

abstract = "Ultrafine particles (UFP, those with diameters ≤ 100 nm), have been reported to potentially penetrate deeply into the respiratory system, translocate through the alveoli, and affect various organs, potentially correlating with increased mortality. The aim of this study is to assess long-term trends (5–11 years) in mostly urban UFP concentrations based on measurements of particle number size distributions (PNSD). Additionally, concentrations of other pollutants and meteorological variables were evaluated to support the interpretations. PNSD datasets from 12 urban background (UB), 5 traffic (TR), 3 suburban background (SUB) and 1 regional background (RB) sites in 15 European cities and 1 in the USA were evaluated. The non-parametric Theil-Sen's method was used to detect monotonic trends. Meta-analyses were carried out to assess the overall trends and those for different environments. The results showed significant decreases in NO, NO2, BC, CO, and particle concentrations in the Aitken (25–100 nm) and the Accumulation (100–800 nm) modes, suggesting a positive impact of the implementation of EURO 5/V and 6/VI vehicle standards on European air quality. The growing use of Diesel Particle Filters (DPFs) might also have clearly reduced exhaust emissions of BC, PM, and the Aitken and Accumulation mode particles. However, as reported by prior studies, there remains an issue of poor control of Nucleation mode particles (smaller than 25 nm), which are not fully reduced with current DPFs, without emission controls for semi-volatile organic compounds, and might have different origins than road traffic. Thus, contrasting trends for Nucleation mode particles were obtained across the cities studied. This mode also affected the UFP and total PNC trends because of the high proportion of Nucleation mode particles in both concentration ranges. It was also found that the urban temperature increasing trends might have also influenced those of PNC, Nucleation and Aitken modes.",

keywords = "Air quality, Ambient air, Nanoparticles, Particle number concentrations",

author = "Meritxell Garcia-Marl{\`e}s and Rosa Lara and Cristina Reche and Noem{\'i} P{\'e}rez and Aurelio Tob{\'i}as and Marjan Savadkoohi and David Beddows and Imre Salma and M{\'a}t{\'e} V{\"o}r{\"o}smarty and Tam{\'a}s Weidinger and Christoph Hueglin and Nikos Mihalopoulos and Georgios Grivas and Panayiotis Kalkavouras and Jakub Ondr{\'a}{\v c}ek and Nadĕ{\v z}da Z{\'i}kov{\'a} and Niemi, {Jarkko V.} and Manninen, {Hanna E.} and Green, {David C.} and Tremper, {Anja H.} and Michael Norman and Stergios Vratolis and Konstantinos Eleftheriadis and G{\'o}mez-Moreno, {Francisco J.} and Elisabeth Alonso-Blanco and Alfred Wiedensohler and Kay Weinhold and Maik Merkel and Susanne Bastian and Barbara Hoffmann and Hicran Altug and Petit, {Jean Eudes} and Olivier Favez and {Dos Santos}, {Sebastiao Martins} and Putaud, {Jean Philippe} and Adelaide Dinoi and Daniele Contini and Hilkka Timonen and Janne Lampilahti and Tuukka Pet{\"a}j{\"a} and Marco Pandolfi and Hopke, {Philip K.} and Harrison, {Roy M.} and Andr{\'e}s Alastuey and Xavier Querol",

note = "Funding Information: RI-URBANS (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, the European Union{\textquoteright}s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, contract 101036245) is a European research project, which demonstrates the applications of advanced air quality service tools in urban Europe to improve the assessment of air quality policies, including a better evaluation of health impacts. In this context, this study aims to gather and evaluate available long-term trends of UFP and different particle size modes, based on PNSD data obtained at 21 (mostly urban) sites from 15 urban areas in Europe (11 member states) and one from the USA. A prior RI-URBANS study ( Trechera et al., 2023 ) reported the phenomenology of UFP in urban Europe and compared the 2017–2019 concentrations across different cities and environments. Additional work is ongoing on the source apportionment of PNSD for 23 (mostly urban) sites using receptor modelling tools. In the current study we evaluate and interpret the trend analyses of the above 21 datasets for a period covering up to 11 years (2009–2019). A number of sites cover a shorter period of time, but in all cases, at least the last 5 years of measurement are available. The years 2020–2022 are intentionally excluded to avoid interferences of the COVID19-lockdown effects. To support interpretations, we also evaluate compiled datasets of conventional pollutants (BC, NO 2 , NO, CO, SO 2 , O 3 , PM 10 , PM 2.5 and PM 1 ) and meteorological variables (temperature, T; relative humidity, RH; atmospheric pressure, P; wind speed, WS; solar radiation, RAD; and rain, R) concurrently measured with the PNSDs. Funding Information: This study is supported by the RI-URBANS project (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, European Union{\textquoteright}s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, Green Deal, European Commission, contract 101036245), the “Agencia Estatal de Investigaci{\'o}n” from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, FEDER funds under the projects AIRPHONEMA (PID2022-142160OB-I00), and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2021 SGR 00447). This research is partly supported by the Hungarian Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. K132254). Funding Information: This study is supported by the RI-URBANS project (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, Green Deal, European Commission, contract 101036245), the “Agencia Estatal de Investigaci{\'o}n” from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, FEDER funds under the projects AIRPHONEMA (PID2022-142160OB-I00), and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2021 SGR 00447). This research is partly supported by the Hungarian Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. K132254). We would like to thank also to ACTRIS for providing PNC-PNSD datasets for a number of sites of this study, and National and City authorities for providing others. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2024 The Authors",

year = "2024",

month = mar,

day = "9",

doi = "10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510",

language = "English",

volume = "185",

journal = "Environment international",

issn = "0160-4120",

publisher = "Elsevier",

}

Garcia-Marlès, M, Lara, R, Reche, C, Pérez, N, Tobías, A, Savadkoohi, M, Beddows, D, Salma, I, Vörösmarty, M, Weidinger, T, Hueglin, C, Mihalopoulos, N, Grivas, G, Kalkavouras, P, Ondráček, J, Zíková, N, Niemi, JV, Manninen, HE, Green, DC, Tremper, AH, Norman, M, Vratolis, S, Eleftheriadis, K, Gómez-Moreno, FJ, Alonso-Blanco, E, Wiedensohler, A, Weinhold, K, Merkel, M, Bastian, S, Hoffmann, B, Altug, H, Petit, JE, Favez, O, Dos Santos, SM, Putaud, JP, Dinoi, A, Contini, D, Timonen, H, Lampilahti, J, Petäjä, T, Pandolfi, M, Hopke, PK, Harrison, RM, Alastuey, A & Querol, X 2024, 'Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe', Environment international, vol. 185, 108510. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510

TY - JOUR

T1 - Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe

AU - Garcia-Marlès, Meritxell

AU - Lara, Rosa

AU - Reche, Cristina

AU - Pérez, Noemí

AU - Tobías, Aurelio

AU - Savadkoohi, Marjan

AU - Beddows, David

AU - Salma, Imre

AU - Vörösmarty, Máté

AU - Weidinger, Tamás

AU - Hueglin, Christoph

AU - Mihalopoulos, Nikos

AU - Grivas, Georgios

AU - Kalkavouras, Panayiotis

AU - Ondráček, Jakub

AU - Zíková, Nadĕžda

AU - Niemi, Jarkko V.

AU - Manninen, Hanna E.

AU - Green, David C.

AU - Tremper, Anja H.

AU - Norman, Michael

AU - Vratolis, Stergios

AU - Eleftheriadis, Konstantinos

AU - Gómez-Moreno, Francisco J.

AU - Alonso-Blanco, Elisabeth

AU - Wiedensohler, Alfred

AU - Weinhold, Kay

AU - Merkel, Maik

AU - Bastian, Susanne

AU - Hoffmann, Barbara

AU - Altug, Hicran

AU - Petit, Jean Eudes

AU - Favez, Olivier

AU - Dos Santos, Sebastiao Martins

AU - Putaud, Jean Philippe

AU - Dinoi, Adelaide

AU - Contini, Daniele

AU - Timonen, Hilkka

AU - Lampilahti, Janne

AU - Petäjä, Tuukka

AU - Pandolfi, Marco

AU - Hopke, Philip K.

AU - Harrison, Roy M.

AU - Alastuey, Andrés

AU - Querol, Xavier

N1 - Funding Information: RI-URBANS (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, contract 101036245) is a European research project, which demonstrates the applications of advanced air quality service tools in urban Europe to improve the assessment of air quality policies, including a better evaluation of health impacts. In this context, this study aims to gather and evaluate available long-term trends of UFP and different particle size modes, based on PNSD data obtained at 21 (mostly urban) sites from 15 urban areas in Europe (11 member states) and one from the USA. A prior RI-URBANS study ( Trechera et al., 2023 ) reported the phenomenology of UFP in urban Europe and compared the 2017–2019 concentrations across different cities and environments. Additional work is ongoing on the source apportionment of PNSD for 23 (mostly urban) sites using receptor modelling tools. In the current study we evaluate and interpret the trend analyses of the above 21 datasets for a period covering up to 11 years (2009–2019). A number of sites cover a shorter period of time, but in all cases, at least the last 5 years of measurement are available. The years 2020–2022 are intentionally excluded to avoid interferences of the COVID19-lockdown effects. To support interpretations, we also evaluate compiled datasets of conventional pollutants (BC, NO 2 , NO, CO, SO 2 , O 3 , PM 10 , PM 2.5 and PM 1 ) and meteorological variables (temperature, T; relative humidity, RH; atmospheric pressure, P; wind speed, WS; solar radiation, RAD; and rain, R) concurrently measured with the PNSDs. Funding Information: This study is supported by the RI-URBANS project (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, Green Deal, European Commission, contract 101036245), the “Agencia Estatal de Investigación” from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, FEDER funds under the projects AIRPHONEMA (PID2022-142160OB-I00), and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2021 SGR 00447). This research is partly supported by the Hungarian Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. K132254). Funding Information: This study is supported by the RI-URBANS project (Research Infrastructures Services Reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial Areas, European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, Green Deal, European Commission, contract 101036245), the “Agencia Estatal de Investigación” from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, FEDER funds under the projects AIRPHONEMA (PID2022-142160OB-I00), and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2021 SGR 00447). This research is partly supported by the Hungarian Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. K132254). We would like to thank also to ACTRIS for providing PNC-PNSD datasets for a number of sites of this study, and National and City authorities for providing others. Publisher Copyright: © 2024 The Authors

PY - 2024/3/9

Y1 - 2024/3/9

N2 - Ultrafine particles (UFP, those with diameters ≤ 100 nm), have been reported to potentially penetrate deeply into the respiratory system, translocate through the alveoli, and affect various organs, potentially correlating with increased mortality. The aim of this study is to assess long-term trends (5–11 years) in mostly urban UFP concentrations based on measurements of particle number size distributions (PNSD). Additionally, concentrations of other pollutants and meteorological variables were evaluated to support the interpretations. PNSD datasets from 12 urban background (UB), 5 traffic (TR), 3 suburban background (SUB) and 1 regional background (RB) sites in 15 European cities and 1 in the USA were evaluated. The non-parametric Theil-Sen's method was used to detect monotonic trends. Meta-analyses were carried out to assess the overall trends and those for different environments. The results showed significant decreases in NO, NO2, BC, CO, and particle concentrations in the Aitken (25–100 nm) and the Accumulation (100–800 nm) modes, suggesting a positive impact of the implementation of EURO 5/V and 6/VI vehicle standards on European air quality. The growing use of Diesel Particle Filters (DPFs) might also have clearly reduced exhaust emissions of BC, PM, and the Aitken and Accumulation mode particles. However, as reported by prior studies, there remains an issue of poor control of Nucleation mode particles (smaller than 25 nm), which are not fully reduced with current DPFs, without emission controls for semi-volatile organic compounds, and might have different origins than road traffic. Thus, contrasting trends for Nucleation mode particles were obtained across the cities studied. This mode also affected the UFP and total PNC trends because of the high proportion of Nucleation mode particles in both concentration ranges. It was also found that the urban temperature increasing trends might have also influenced those of PNC, Nucleation and Aitken modes.

AB - Ultrafine particles (UFP, those with diameters ≤ 100 nm), have been reported to potentially penetrate deeply into the respiratory system, translocate through the alveoli, and affect various organs, potentially correlating with increased mortality. The aim of this study is to assess long-term trends (5–11 years) in mostly urban UFP concentrations based on measurements of particle number size distributions (PNSD). Additionally, concentrations of other pollutants and meteorological variables were evaluated to support the interpretations. PNSD datasets from 12 urban background (UB), 5 traffic (TR), 3 suburban background (SUB) and 1 regional background (RB) sites in 15 European cities and 1 in the USA were evaluated. The non-parametric Theil-Sen's method was used to detect monotonic trends. Meta-analyses were carried out to assess the overall trends and those for different environments. The results showed significant decreases in NO, NO2, BC, CO, and particle concentrations in the Aitken (25–100 nm) and the Accumulation (100–800 nm) modes, suggesting a positive impact of the implementation of EURO 5/V and 6/VI vehicle standards on European air quality. The growing use of Diesel Particle Filters (DPFs) might also have clearly reduced exhaust emissions of BC, PM, and the Aitken and Accumulation mode particles. However, as reported by prior studies, there remains an issue of poor control of Nucleation mode particles (smaller than 25 nm), which are not fully reduced with current DPFs, without emission controls for semi-volatile organic compounds, and might have different origins than road traffic. Thus, contrasting trends for Nucleation mode particles were obtained across the cities studied. This mode also affected the UFP and total PNC trends because of the high proportion of Nucleation mode particles in both concentration ranges. It was also found that the urban temperature increasing trends might have also influenced those of PNC, Nucleation and Aitken modes.

KW - Air quality

KW - Ambient air

KW - Nanoparticles

KW - Particle number concentrations

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85187199794&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510

DO - 10.1016/j.envint.2024.108510

M3 - Article

C2 - 38460241

AN - SCOPUS:85187199794

SN - 0160-4120

VL - 185

JO - Environment international

JF - Environment international

M1 - 108510

ER -

Inter-annual trends of ultrafine particles in urban Europe

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

UN SDGs

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Projects

RI-URBANS: Research Infrastructures services reinforcing Air Quality Monitoring Capacities in European Urban & Industrial areaS

Cite this