Ambient marine shipping emissions determined by vessel operation mode along the East China Sea

Marine shipping emissions exert important air quality and climate impacts. This study characterized the ambient pollutants predominant by emissions from a variety of marine vessel types near the mid-latitude East China Sea. Two discernible primary shipping emissions were identified by factorization analysis on detailed mass spectra of organic aerosol (OA), as emissions in maneuvering and cruise, highly linked with NOx (and less oxidized OA, black carbon, BC) or CO (and more oxidized OA), respectively. Using radio-recorded quantities and activities of 3566 vessels mixed with slow and high-speed diesel engines, we found emission of NOx or BC per vessel was positively correlated with vessel speed, while CO emission peaked at moderate speed. The approach here based on vessel operation mode directly linked the vessel activities to ambient concentrations of pollutants from marine shipping emission, and may synthesize the complex vessel types in shipping emission inventory. (C) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This study characterized the ambient pollutants predominant from a variety of marine vessel types by analyzing detailed mass spectra of organic aerosol. Two primary shipping emissions were identified, linked with vessel speed, NOx (and less oxidized OA, BC) and CO (and more oxidized OA), respectively. The approach based on vessel operation mode provided new insights for studying shipping emissions.