Apr 15, 2021
Kuwait and the Gulf region have a desert, hyper-arid and hot climate that makes outdoor air sampling challenging. The region is also affected by intense dust storms. Monitoring challenges from the harsh climate have limited data needed to inform appropriate regulatory actions to address air pollution in the region.
To compare gravimetric measurements with existing networks that rely on beta-attenuation measurements in a desert climate; determine the annual levels of PM and PM over a two-year period in Kuwait; assess compliance with air quality standards; and identify and quantify PM sources.
We custom-designed particle samplers that can withstand large quantities of dust without their inlet becoming overloaded. The samplers were placed in two populated residential locations, one in Kuwait City and another near industrial and petrochemical facilities in Ali Sabah Al-Salem (ASAS) to collect PM and PM samples for mass and elemental analysis. We used positive matrix factorization to identify PM sources and apportion their contributions.