Brown carbon's emission factors and optical characteristics in household biomass burning: developing a novel algorithm for estimating the contribution of brown carbon

Abstract

Recent studies have highlighted the importance of brown carbon (BrC) in various fields, particularly relating to climate change. The incomplete combustion of biomass in open and contained burning conditions is believed to be a significant contributor to primary BrC emissions. So far, few studies have reported the emission factors of BrC from biomass burning, and few studies have specifically addressed which form of light-absorbing carbon, such as black carbon (BC) or BrC, plays a leading role in the total solar light absorption by biomass burning. In this study, the optical integrating sphere (IS) approach was used, with carbon black and humic acid sodium salt as reference materials for BC and BrC, respectively, to distinguish BrC from BC on filter samples. A total of 11 widely used biomass types in China were burned in a typical stove to simulate the real household combustion process. (i) Large differences existed in the emission factors of BrC (EFBrC) among the tested biomass fuels, with a geometric mean EFBrC of 0.71 g kg−1 (0.24–2.09). Both the plant type (herbaceous or ligneous) and burning style (raw or briquetted biomass) might influence the value of EFBrC. The observed reduction in the emissions of light-absorbing carbon (LAC) confirmed an additional benefit of biomass briquetting in climate change mitigation. (ii) The calculated annual BrC emissions from China's household biomass burning amounted to 712 Gg, higher than the contribution from China's household coal combustion (592 Gg). (iii) The average absorption Ångström exponent (AAE) was (2.46±0.53), much higher than that of coal-chunk combustion smoke (AAE=1.30±0.32). (iv) For biomass smoke, the contribution of absorption by BrC to the total absorption by BC+BrC across the strongest solar spectral range of 350–850 nm (FBrC) was 50.8 %. This is nearly twice that for BrC in smoke from household coal combustion (26.5 %). (v) Based on this study, a novel algorithm was developed for estimating the FBrC for perhaps any combustion source (FBrC=0.5519ln⁡AAE+0.0067, R2=0.999); the FBrC value for all global biomass burning (open+contained) (FBrC-entire) was 64.5 % (58.5 %–69.9 %). This corroborates the dominant role of BrC in total biomass burning absorption. Therefore, the inclusion of BrC is not optional but indispensable when considering the climate energy budget, particularly for biomass burning emissions (contained and open).