Health risk assessment of exposure to various vapors and fumes in a factory of automobile manufacturing

This study aimed to comprehensively evaluate the health risk of exposure to various vapors and fumes in a factory of automobile manufacturing. This study was performed in 2021 on 115 workers. Vapors and fumes were gathered by the adsorbent tubes of activated charcoal and mixed cellulose esters (MCE) membrane filter, respectively. The flow rate for vapors and fumes were between 0.05 and 0.20 L per min and 1 to 4 L per min, respectively. After preparing, samples were analyzed. To assess the non-cancer and cancer risk of the pollutants, the method proposed environmental protection agency (EPA) was applied. The total concentration of copper (1.031 ppm), manganese (0.114), and 2-butoxyethanol (91.767 ppm) were found to be higher than The threshold limit values (TLVs). The values of non-cancer risk (HQ) due to exposure to vapors of benzene (6.583), toluene (1.396), ethyl benzene (1.212), xylene (31.148), 2-butoxyethanol (89.302), 2-propanol (4.695), 1,2,3-trimethylbenzene (1.923), copper (2.336), manganese (715.82), aluminum (3.772), and chromium (107.066) were higher than the acceptable limit. Moreover, the estimated LCR for benzene (2.15 x 10-4), ethyl benzene (3.97 x 10-4), vinyl chloride (1.25 x 10-4), and chromium (2.11 x 10-2) were higher than the threshold risk level set by EPA. It is emphasized that preventive measures are performed.

Automated summary

This study comprehensively evaluated the health risk of exposure to various vapors and fumes in an automobile manufacturing factory. The study was conducted in 2021 on 115 workers. Vapors and fumes were collected using activated charcoal adsorbent tubes and MCE membrane filters. The concentrations of certain pollutants exceeded the threshold limit values, indicating a higher health risk. Preventive measures should be implemented to reduce the risk.