Fate of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Petroleum Biomarker Compounds in Road Asphalt
dc.contributor | Terry, Leigh | |
dc.contributor | Esfahani, Milad R. | |
dc.contributor.advisor | Clement, T. Prabhakar | |
dc.contributor.author | Kinali, Kubra | |
dc.contributor.other | University of Alabama Tuscaloosa | |
dc.date.accessioned | 2022-02-04T20:16:46Z | |
dc.date.available | 2022-02-04T20:16:46Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2021 | |
dc.description | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation | en_US |
dc.description.abstract | Almost six thousand types of petroleum-based products are being used all around the world on a regular basis. Some of these petroleum products can have a devastating effect on water, air, and soil environments. For instance, oil spills pose large-scale threats to water and soil quality and also can impact human health due to the carcinogenic and toxic components in petroleum. Asphalt, which is commonly used to pave roads, is an interesting petroleum byproduct that contains some toxic and carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and can pose considerable risk to the environment. Runoff from the asphalt surfaces can generate contaminated stormwater that can pollute water bodies. Recently, it has been estimated that the world asphalt usage is approximately 102 million tons per year. Therefore, understanding the fate of PAHs and other hazardous compounds in asphalt is an important environmental problem.In this study, a newly paved parking lot at the University of Alabama was used as a sampling site to track the fate of PAHs under natural weathering conditions. The asphalt samples were collected for over two years, 2019-2021, to determine the weathering levels of PAHs and petroleum biomarkers (terpanes) with time. All asphalt samples were analyzed using a GC/MS method run in the selected ion monitoring (SIM) mode. The results show that the most dominant PAH compounds in all the asphalt samples are chrysene, which is well-known as a toxic chemical. Concentrations of some of the lighter PAHs, such as naphthalene, degraded rapidly; however, several heavy PAHs concentrated over the same time period. Our study also showed that some of the lower molecular weight tricyclic terpanes such as TR21, TR22, TR23 and TR24 weathered slightly during this period. All the pentacyclic terpanes remained stable and resisted weathering over the two-year period. | en_US |
dc.format.medium | electronic | |
dc.format.mimetype | application/pdf | |
dc.identifier.other | http://purl.lib.ua.edu/181747 | |
dc.identifier.other | u0015_0000001_0004037 | |
dc.identifier.other | Kinali_alatus_0004M_14691 | |
dc.identifier.uri | http://ir.ua.edu/handle/123456789/8312 | |
dc.language | English | |
dc.language.iso | en_US | |
dc.publisher | University of Alabama Libraries | |
dc.relation.hasversion | born digital | |
dc.relation.ispartof | The University of Alabama Electronic Theses and Dissertations | |
dc.relation.ispartof | The University of Alabama Libraries Digital Collections | |
dc.rights | All rights reserved by the author unless otherwise indicated. | en_US |
dc.subject | Petroleum biomarkers | |
dc.subject | Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons | |
dc.subject | Road asphalt | |
dc.title | Fate of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Petroleum Biomarker Compounds in Road Asphalt | en_US |
dc.type | thesis | |
dc.type | text | |
etdms.degree.department | University of Alabama. Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering | |
etdms.degree.discipline | Environmental engineering | |
etdms.degree.grantor | The University of Alabama | |
etdms.degree.level | master's | |
etdms.degree.name | M.S. |
Files
Original bundle
1 - 1 of 1