Air Pollution Conditions near Peat Fire-Prone Areas during El Niño in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia

Author(s):  
Hiroshi Hayasaka ◽  
Alpon Sepriando ◽  
Aswin Usup ◽  
Naito Daisuke
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 100
Author(s):  
Nina Yulianti ◽  
Kitso Kusin ◽  
Daisuke Naito ◽  
Masahiro Kawasaki ◽  
Osamu Kozan ◽  
...  

<p class="Abstract">fires in Indonesia. About thirty percent of the total fires are spread in Central Kalimantan Province. Symptoms of climate change in the form of increasingly frequent weather and extreme climate phenomena support the severity of forest and land fires which results in increased release of air pollution gases. In 2015, the peak fire months had emitted a high concentration of air pollutant gasses and causes hazardous air pollution. This study aims to investigate the latest severe fire occurrence and haze conditions in Central Kalimantan. Hotspot data was from 2006 to 2017, visibility data were from four times of El Niño event, Particle Matter Size 10 (PM 10) data and Pollution Standard Index (PSI) was from very strong El Niño in 2015 comparison to La Niña in 2016/2017. The results showed that the top incidents occurred not only very strong in 2015 but also weak El Niño in 2006. The most of dense hotspots density in the last twelve years (&gt; 50% of fires in the area) found in peatlands in Pulang Pisau, Palangka Raya and Kapuas.  Palangka Raya's case, dangerous of APSI with PM10 concentrations of more than 500 µg m-3 occurred for 2 (two) months, from the end of August to the early of November 2015. The maximum peak concentration of PM10 is as high as 3000 μg m-3, which is higher than other fire years. Based on the data obtained, the haze was blanketed Palangka Raya was getting thicker at the end of October. As a result, visibility is decreasingly limited, only around 200 to 900 m during the peak season and air pollution-related-peat fire. Thus, this severe condition could rose multiple effects, which will exacerbate climate change, environmental sustainability and the livelihoods of thousands of peoples.</p>


2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (18) ◽  
pp. 11711-11732 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chelsea E. Stockwell ◽  
Thilina Jayarathne ◽  
Mark A. Cochrane ◽  
Kevin C. Ryan ◽  
Erianto I. Putra ◽  
...  

Abstract. Peat fires in Southeast Asia have become a major annual source of trace gases and particles to the regional–global atmosphere. The assessment of their influence on atmospheric chemistry, climate, air quality, and health has been uncertain partly due to a lack of field measurements of the smoke characteristics. During the strong 2015 El Niño event we deployed a mobile smoke sampling team in the Indonesian province of Central Kalimantan on the island of Borneo and made the first, or rare, field measurements of trace gases, aerosol optical properties, and aerosol mass emissions for authentic peat fires burning at various depths in different peat types. This paper reports the trace gas and aerosol measurements obtained by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, whole air sampling, photoacoustic extinctiometers (405 and 870 nm), and a small subset of the data from analyses of particulate filters. The trace gas measurements provide emission factors (EFs; grams of a compound per kilogram biomass burned) for up to  ∼  90 gases, including CO2, CO, CH4, non-methane hydrocarbons up to C10, 15 oxygenated organic compounds, NH3, HCN, NOx, OCS, HCl, etc. The modified combustion efficiency (MCE) of the smoke sources ranged from 0.693 to 0.835 with an average of 0.772 ± 0.053 (n  =  35), indicating essentially pure smoldering combustion, and the emissions were not initially strongly lofted. The major trace gas emissions by mass (EF as g kg−1) were carbon dioxide (1564 ± 77), carbon monoxide (291 ± 49), methane (9.51 ± 4.74), hydrogen cyanide (5.75 ± 1.60), acetic acid (3.89 ± 1.65), ammonia (2.86 ± 1.00), methanol (2.14 ± 1.22), ethane (1.52 ± 0.66), dihydrogen (1.22 ± 1.01), propylene (1.07 ± 0.53), propane (0.989 ± 0.644), ethylene (0.961 ± 0.528), benzene (0.954 ± 0.394), formaldehyde (0.867 ± 0.479), hydroxyacetone (0.860 ± 0.433), furan (0.772 ± 0.035), acetaldehyde (0.697 ± 0.460), and acetone (0.691 ± 0.356). These field data support significant revision of the EFs for CO2 (−8 %), CH4 (−55 %), NH3 (−86 %), CO (+39 %), and other gases compared with widely used recommendations for tropical peat fires based on a lab study of a single sample published in 2003. BTEX compounds (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylenes) are important air toxics and aerosol precursors and were emitted in total at 1.5 ± 0.6 g kg−1. Formaldehyde is probably the air toxic gas most likely to cause local exposures that exceed recommended levels. The field results from Kalimantan were in reasonable agreement with recent lab measurements of smoldering Kalimantan peat for “overlap species,” lending importance to the lab finding that burning peat produces large emissions of acetamide, acrolein, methylglyoxal, etc., which were not measurable in the field with the deployed equipment and implying value in continued similar efforts. The aerosol optical data measured include EFs for the scattering and absorption coefficients (EF Bscat and EF Babs, m2 kg−1 fuel burned) and the single scattering albedo (SSA) at 870 and 405 nm, as well as the absorption Ångström exponents (AAE). By coupling the absorption and co-located trace gas and filter data we estimated black carbon (BC) EFs (g kg−1) and the mass absorption coefficient (MAC, m2 g−1) for the bulk organic carbon (OC) due to brown carbon (BrC). Consistent with the minimal flaming, the emissions of BC were negligible (0.0055 ± 0.0016 g kg−1). Aerosol absorption at 405 nm was  ∼  52 times larger than at 870 nm and BrC contributed  ∼  96 % of the absorption at 405 nm. Average AAE was 4.97 ± 0.65 (range, 4.29–6.23). The average SSA at 405 nm (0.974 ± 0.016) was marginally lower than the average SSA at 870 nm (0.998 ± 0.001). These data facilitate modeling climate-relevant aerosol optical properties across much of the UV/visible spectrum and the high AAE and lower SSA at 405 nm demonstrate the dominance of absorption by the organic aerosol. Comparing the Babs at 405 nm to the simultaneously measured OC mass on filters suggests a low MAC ( ∼  0.1) for the bulk OC, as expected for the low BC/OC ratio in the aerosol. The importance of pyrolysis (at lower MCE), as opposed to glowing (at higher MCE), in producing BrC is seen in the increase of AAE with lower MCE (r2 =  0.65).


2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chelsea E. Stockwell ◽  
Thilina Jayarathne ◽  
Mark A. Cochrane ◽  
Kevin C. Ryan ◽  
Erianto I. Putra ◽  
...  

Abstract. Peat fires in Southeast Asia have become a major annual source of trace gases and particles to the regional-global atmosphere. The assessment of their influence on atmospheric chemistry, climate, air quality, and health has been uncertain partly due to a lack of field measurements of the smoke characteristics. During the strong 2015 El Niño event we deployed a mobile smoke sampling team in the Indonesian province of Central Kalimantan on the island of Borneo and made the first, or rare, field measurements of trace gases, aerosol optical properties, and aerosol mass emissions for authentic peat fires burning at various depths in different peat types. This paper reports the trace gas and aerosol measurements obtained by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, whole air sampling, photoacoustic extinctiometers (405 and 870 nm), and a small subset of the data from analyses of particulate filters. The trace gas measurements provide emission factors (EFs, g compound per kg biomass burned) for CO2, CO, CH4, non-methane hydrocarbons up to C10, 15 oxygenated organic compounds, NH3, HCN, NOx, OCS, HCl, etc.; up to ~90 gases in all. The modified combustion efficiency (MCE) of the smoke sources ranged from 0.693 to 0.835 with an average of 0.772 ± 0.053 (n = 35) indicating essentially pure smoldering combustion and the emissions were not initially strongly lofted. The major trace gas emissions by mass (EF as g/kg) were: carbon dioxide (1564 ± 77), carbon monoxide (291 ± 49), methane (9.51 ± 4.74), hydrogen cyanide (5.75 ± 1.60), acetic acid (3.89 ± 1.65), ammonia (2.86 ± 1.00), methanol (2.14 ± 1.22), ethane (1.52 ± 0.66), dihydrogen (1.22 ± 1.01), propylene (1.07 ± 0.53), propane (0.989 ± 0.644), ethylene (0.961 ± 0.528), benzene (0.954 ± 0.394), formaldehyde (0.867 ± 0.479), hydroxyacetone (0.860 ± 0.433), furan (0.772 ± 0.035), acetaldehyde (0.697 ± 0.460), and acetone (0.691 ± 0.356). These field data support significant revision of the EFs for CO2 (−8 %), CH4 (−55 %), NH3 (−86 %), CO (+39 %) and other gases compared with widely-used recommendations for tropical peat fires based on a lab study of a single sample published in 2003. BTEX compounds (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylenes) are important air toxics and aerosol precursors and were emitted in total at 1.5 ± 0.6 g/kg. Formaldehyde is probably the air toxic gas most likely to cause local exposures that exceed recommended levels. The field results from Kalimantan were in reasonable agreement with recent (2012) lab measurements of smoldering Kalimantan peat for “overlap species,” lending importance to the lab finding that burning peat produces large emissions of acetamide, acrolein, methylglyoxal, etc., which were not measureable in the field with the deployed equipment and implying value in continued similar efforts. The aerosol optical data measured include EFs for the scattering and absorption coefficients (EF Bscat and EF Babs, m2/kg fuel burned) and the single scattering albedo (SSA) at 870 and 405 nm, as well as the absorption Ångstrӧm exponents (AAE). By coupling the absorption and co-located trace gas and filter data we estimated black carbon (BC) EFs (g/kg) and the mass absorption coefficient (MAC, m2/g) for the bulk organic carbon (OC) due to brown carbon (BrC). Consistent with the minimal flaming, the emissions of BC were negligible (0.0055 ± 0.0016 g/kg). Aerosol absorption at 405 nm was ~52 times larger than at 870 nm and BrC contributed ~96 % of the absorption at 405 nm. Average AAE was 4.97 ± 0.65 (range, 4.29–6.23). The average SSA at 405 nm (0.974 ± 0.016) was marginally lower than the average SSA at 870 nm (0.998 ± 0.001). These data facilitate modeling climate-relevant aerosol optical properties across much of the UV/visible spectrum and the high AAE and lower SSA at 405 nm demonstrate the dominance of absorption by the organic aerosol. Comparing the Babs at 405 nm to the simultaneously measured OC mass on filters suggests a low MAC (~0.1) for the bulk OC, as expected for the low BC / OC ratio in the aerosol. The importance of pyrolysis (at lower MCE), as opposed to glowing (at higher MCE), in producing BrC is seen in the increase of AAE with lower MCE (r2 = 0.65).


2004 ◽  
Vol 4 (8) ◽  
pp. 2145-2160 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Langmann ◽  
A. Heil

Abstract. Smoke-haze episodes caused by vegetation and peat fires affect parts of Indonesia every year with significant impacts on human health and climate. Particularly fires in degenerated peat areas release huge amounts of trace gases, e.g. CO2, CO and CH4, and particles into the atmosphere, exceeding by far the emissions per unit area from fires in surface vegetation. However, only limited information is available about the current distribution of pristine and degenerated peat areas in Indonesia, their depth, drainage condition and modification by fire. Particularly during the strong El Niño event in 1997/1998 a huge uncertainty exists about the contribution of Indonesian peat fire emissions to the measured increase of atmospheric CO2, as the published estimates of the peat area burned differ considerably. In this paper we study the contribution of peat fire emissions in Indonesia during the El Niño event 1997/1998. A regional three-dimensional atmosphere-chemistry model is applied over Indonesia using two emission estimates. These vegetation and peat fire emission inventories for Indonesia are set up in 0.5° resolution in weekly intervals and differ only in the size of the fire affected peat areas. We evaluate simulated rainfall and particle concentrations by comparison with observations to draw conclusions on the total carbon emissions released from the vegetation and peat fires in Indonesia in 1997/1998.


2022 ◽  
pp. 84-103
Author(s):  
Ida Bagus Mandhara Brasika

This study was conducted to model fire occurrence within El Nino variability and peatland distribution. These climate and geographical factors have a significant impact on forest fires in tropical areas such as Indonesia. The re-analysis dataset from ECMWF was observed with respect to climate characteristics in Indonesian El Nino events. The INFERNO (INteractive Fire and Emission algoRithm for Natural envirOnments) was utilized to simulate fires over Borneo Island due to its capability to simulate large-scale fires with simplified parameters. There were some adjustments in this INFERNO model, especially for peat fire as peatland has a significant impact on fires. The first was the contribution of climate to the peat fire which is represented by long-term precipitation. The second was the combustion completeness of peat fire occurrence that is mainly affected by human-induced peat drainage. The result of the model shows that El Nino variability mainly affected peat fires but was unable to well simulate the above-ground fire. It increased the burnt area during strong El Nino but overestimated the fires during low/no El Nino season due to lack of peat fire ignition in the calculation. Moreover, as the model did not provide peat drainage simulation, it underestimated the carbon emission. This model has shown promising results by addressing key features in limited input data, but improving some simulations is necessary for regulating weak/no El Nino conditions and carbon combustion of peat fire.


2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 2585-2600 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thilina Jayarathne ◽  
Chelsea E. Stockwell ◽  
Ashley A. Gilbert ◽  
Kaitlyn Daugherty ◽  
Mark A. Cochrane ◽  
...  

Abstract. Fine particulate matter (PM2.5) was collected in situ from peat smoke during the 2015 El Niño peat fire episode in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia. Twenty-one PM samples were collected from 18 peat fire plumes that were primarily smoldering with modified combustion efficiency (MCE) values of 0.725–0.833. PM emissions were determined and chemically characterized for elemental carbon (EC), organic carbon (OC), water-soluble OC, water-soluble ions, metals, and organic species. Fuel-based PM2.5 mass emission factors (EFs) ranged from 6.0 to 29.6 g kg−1 with an average of 17.3 ± 6.0 g kg−1. EC was detected only in 15 plumes and comprised  ∼ 1 % of PM mass. Together, OC (72 %), EC (1 %), water-soluble ions (1 %), and metal oxides (0.1 %) comprised 74 ± 11 % of gravimetrically measured PM mass. Assuming that the remaining mass is due to elements that form organic matter (OM; i.e., elements O, H, N) an OM-to-OC conversion factor of 1.26 was estimated by linear regression. Overall, chemical speciation revealed the following characteristics of peat-burning emissions: high OC mass fractions (72 %), primarily water-insoluble OC (84 ± 11 %C), low EC mass fractions (1 %), vanillic to syringic acid ratios of 1.9, and relatively high n-alkane contributions to OC (6.2 %C) with a carbon preference index of 1.2–1.6. Comparison to laboratory studies of peat combustion revealed similarities in the relative composition of PM but greater differences in the absolute EF values. The EFs developed herein, combined with estimates of the mass of peat burned, are used to estimate that 3.2–11 Tg of PM2.5 was emitted to atmosphere during the 2015 El Niño peatland fire event in Indonesia. Combined with gas-phase measurements of CO2, CO, CH4, and volatile organic carbon from Stockwell et al. (2016), it is determined that OC and EC accounted for 2.1 and 0.04 % of total carbon emissions, respectively. These in situ EFs can be used to improve the accuracy of the representation of Indonesian peat burning in emission inventories and receptor-based models.


Author(s):  
Nina Yulianti ◽  
Kitso Kusin ◽  
Elvi Murni ◽  
Betrixia Barbara ◽  
Daisuke Naito ◽  
...  

Central Kalimantan covers an area of 157,983 km2 with more than 2,000 km2 of tropical peatlands, which is one of the buffer regions of Indonesia's new capital government city. However, the sad story is the conversion of about one million hectares from peat swamp forests (PSF) to rice fields occurred in the mid-1990s, so called the Mega Rice Project (MRP). Since then, forest and peatland fires become an annual event due to high level of degradation under the climate change symptoms such the frequent of the El Niño event. In very strong El Niño of 2015, Indonesia has returned to the world spotlight in relation to the fires and the haze crisis. The most fire prone area was recorded in the iconic Tumbang Nusa, Pulang Pisau Regency and its adjecent areas. However, the thick haze had covered almost the entire province. There are the dis-adventages impact during more than two months. Therefore, this study was to investigate what are the causes and the impacts of this disaster at the site level. This research location was focuses on three regencies and one city namely Pulang Pisau, Kapuas, Katingan and Palangka City. The method was a Focus Group Discussion (FGD) with key figures representing eight clusters of village communities. This method is also supported by statistical, hotspots and spatial data for additional analysis. The result are only two villages with very high average of hotspot and eight with high average of hotspots in Pulang Pisau and Kapuas Regency. Further, the FGDs in seven villages showed that there were three main clusters that caused forest-land fires, namely natural factors, human factors and village policy / regulation factors. The villages study that were affected by the fire in 2015 showed there were three main impacts namely on people, environment and capital. This result is a foundation of cause-effect factor for further Root Cause Analysis to find out the options for fire prevention and management in climate change mitigation efforts. Keywords: Climate Change; El-Niño; Fires; Focus Group Discussion; Peatland


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