Elevated atmospheric deposition and dynamics of mercury in a remote upland forest of southwestern China

• Published in: Environmental pollution (1987) Vol. 158; no. 6; pp. 2324 - 2333
• Main Authors: Fu, Xuewu, Feng, Xinbin, Zhu, Wanze, Rothenberg, S., Yao, Heng, Zhang, Hui
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Kidlington Elsevier Ltd 01.06.2010; Elsevier Science Ltd; Elsevier
• Subjects: Air Pollutants - analysis; Altitude; Animal, plant and microbial ecology; Applied ecology; Atmosphere - analysis; Atmospheric deposition; Atmospherics; Biological and medical sciences; China; Climatic Processes; Coal; Combustion; Deposition; dry deposition; Ecotoxicology, biological effects of pollution; Elevated; elevated atmospheric gases; emissions; Flux; Fluxes; forest soils; Forestry; Forests; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; General aspects; General forest ecology; Generalities. Production, biomass. Quality of wood and forest products. General forest ecology; Hg budget; Kinetics; Mercury; Mercury - analysis; Particulate Matter - analysis; Plant Leaves - chemistry; Plant Leaves - growth & development; Plant Leaves - metabolism; Rivers - chemistry; Soil - analysis; Soil Pollutants - analysis; Southwest; Trees - chemistry; Trees - growth & development; Trees - metabolism; Upland forest; volatilization; wet deposition; Asia; China; China, People's Rep; Flux; Upland forest; Atmospheric deposition; Hg budget; Hg; Forests; Atmospheric fallout; Pollutant behavior; Heavy metal; Transport process; Trace element; Pollutant; Atmospheric dynamics; Pollution; Environment; Poison; Mercury
• ISSN: 0269-7491; 1873-6424
• DOI: 10.1016/j.envpol.2010.01.032

Mt. Gongga area in southwest China was impacted by Hg emissions from industrial activities and coal combustion, and annual means of atmospheric TGM and PHg concentrations at a regional background station were 3.98 ng m −3 and 30.7 pg m −3, respectively. This work presents a mass balance study of Hg in an upland forest in this area. Atmospheric deposition was highly elevated in the study area, with the annual mean THg deposition flux of 92.5 μg m −2 yr −1. Total deposition was dominated by dry deposition (71.8%), and wet deposition accounted for the remaining 28.2%. Forest was a large pool of atmospheric Hg, and nearly 76% of the atmospheric input was stored in forest soil. Volatilization and stream outflow were identified as the two major pathways for THg losses from the forest, which yielded mean output fluxes of 14.0 and 8.6 μg m −2 yr −1, respectively. Upland forest ecosystem is a great sink of atmospheric mercury in southwest China.