LTR - Ep 65 - What Are Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons aka PAHs?

In this 65th episode, I discuss "What Are Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons aka PAHs?"

PAHs stands for Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons.  Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons are 1,000s of chemical compounds that are created during the incomplete combustion or burning of physical materials.  The Ashes generated during the combustion process are full of PAHs.

PAHs have many Benzene rings in them, thus their toxic nature is obvious.  Most PAHs have been found to be carcinogens.  For this reason, we must be conscious of their sources and limit our exposure to them.

The most common sources of PAHs contamination is from Forest Fires, Volcano Eruptions, Vehicle, Power and Industrial Plant Exhaust.  Other contamination sources are the production, transport and refining of petroleum, the use of refined fuels that generate exhaust, the burning of Agricultural Fields, runoff from Asphalt Roads, Spills of Petroleum Products and Burning of Coal and Tar products.  Even the burning of fire places and burning and smoking of meat for consumption, can generate PAHs.

Once generated into ashes from incomplete combustion, they become easily spread in our environmental by Wind/Air, Water and through Aquatic Life.  Since they do not easily breakdown, they can quickly and easily spread over huge distances.  Due to their toxic and carcinogenic nature, they are a major environmental contaminate of concern.

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:27

Hey there, let's talk remediation. This is your host, Charles Fader, and this is our 65th episode of Let's Talk Remediation. Our 65th episode is brought to us by our ongoing sponsor, Hambi Environmental. Hambi Environmental is a manufacturer of field test kits, field test kits for the immediate analysis of petroleum hydrocarbons, PFAS and PFAS, and chlorides, providing fast, accurate, and economical results. So thank you, Hambi Environmental, for your ongoing support of this podcast. Let's talk remediation, where we're trying to have a positive impact on the environmental remediation industry. And with that, let's get started with our 65th episode. Our 65th episode is what are polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, also known as PAHs. Now, that is a mouthful. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Poly meaning mini, cyclic meaning multiple connections of aromatic hydrocarbons. Okay, so from now on, instead of saying polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, we're gonna stick with the acronym PAHs. PAHs. PAHs are a group of over uh a hundred different chemical compounds. However, in each of those chemical compounds, there are lots of derivatives. So it ends up being that PAHs are over thousands of different types of chemical compounds formed during the incomplete burning of physical uh substances such as um different petroleum products like coal and oil and fuels uh to physical things uh in nature like wood to man-made things like garbage uh or other types of physical organic substances. So what happens is uh in the combustion or burning process or the incomplete burning process for that matter, uh polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons or PAHs are generated and they are released into our environment and they are very persistent, just like in our last episode when we talked about PCBs, uh uh they are persistent to breaking down naturally in the environment. So they take a long time to break down, and that makes it easier for them to travel and spread. And so for that reason, they are a major environmental pollutant uh because they're toxic and they uh carcinogenic as well. They've been found to uh be uh cancerous, creating cancer. So for that reason, uh PAHs are a uh uh major environmental contaminant of concern. So what exactly are PAHs? Again, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Um, so again, the polypart meaning many and acyclic meaning uh multiple things combined to the compounds, uh a lot of them are actually uh many of them are uh benzene based, okay? And so we all know that benzene is uh not a good uh uh chemical. It's toxic to human health uh and our environment. So uh and there's lots of different derivatives that attach different things uh to benzene, multiple benzene rings attached to themselves, and some other things join them, uh, and lots of benzene rings there. So uh again, it comes from the incomplete burning or combustion of physical things. Now, uh one of the more uh I guess I I don't know if I would call it naturally occurring because I don't think that forest fires are naturally occurring. Uh they they they didn't just most of the time didn't start on their own, but nevertheless, forest fires, again, if you think about it, as fire is um moving throughout the you know the forest or you know the the trees and traveling is constantly burning more and more stuff, and most of the time it's not burned to be incomplete, it's burned to ash, all right. And in the ashes is where the PAH is found. So forest fires is one of the main contributors to uh PAH uh contamination. And why is that? Because it produces mass quantities of burnt stuff, and that creates lots of ash, and that ash can travel whether it's converted into gas and it goes into our atmosphere with this the small fine particles with the PAHs in it, and then it goes travels long distance and comes down in the rain, or if it's on the surface and then rain water travels down the surface and carries it away and through the soils and ultimately into our rivers and creeks and lakes and stuff like in ponds and and uh oceans and stuff like that. So that is how forest fires produce a lot of PAHs. Now, other another I say naturally occurring type thing, which you know we don't have too many of these here in the US, but um volcanoes, volcanoes when they explode uh produce a lot of PAHs. Of course, those go up into our atmosphere and up into our air, and the trade winds carry them long distances. So that is another way that large quantities of PAHs travel. Um, you know, the trade winds are a major thing because the fine particles go up into the air and they get caught by the train uh winds and they travel long distances. And no matter what, they're eventually gonna come down. Whether they come down uh on their own, they float down, or it comes from you know, precipitation of rain and snow, that type of thing. And then of course it's gonna, you know, maybe it gets to the surface on the ground, but then it's gonna travel some more. You know, it's gonna travel whether it sits there or it travels via uh runoff from rainwaters, that type of thing. Again, it's not breaking down of the pHs, it's spreading them over long distances. So uh trade winds uh and rain and other precipitation uh, you know, are main contributors of how the pH is spread. Now, those are the more naturally occurring types, right? Um, you know, the forest fires and the volcano eruptions, but they're also uh man-made, right? Man-made would come from uh the types of combustion coming from, say, the burning of fuels coming out, exhaust, vehicle exhaust, uh is a is a big one. Um also uh from you know, plants, you know, uh coal-fired plants, you know, the the uh exhaust coming off though the power plants, you know, that is going to create and spread a lot of PAH contamination. Um so industrial emissions, uh just refining different petroleum products in general, just the refining process, you know, because you're adding heat to refine crude oil. Um there's all kinds of PAs in crude oils and fuels that are you know created from the refining of the petroleum. Um the roads that we put, the infrastructure we put out there, the asphalt roads. Well, asphalt comes from, you know, you you typically use coal tar uh in your asphalt, and that tar, again, is a derivative of uh petroleum or crude oil, and asphalt has tons of pHs in it. So you put some asphalt roads out there, and of course it rains, and boom, it's spreading pHs all over the place. So that is another man-made uh type. Um, you know, uh any type you if physical burning of some type of organic material is going to create uh pHs. So along those lines, tobacco smoke. Yeah. You wonder why people who smoke uh tobacco end up getting you know cancer. Well, that's because of the pHs there that are in the tobacco and in the smoke that they're inhaling, as well as when they exhale, you know, uh the people around them are getting exposed to those pHs as well. Then um, you know, uh there are uh you know different tars for roofing, uh creoso, roofing tar, uh some plastics and pesticides, you know, they have pHs in them as well because they're all you know petroleum-based. So if you think about it, any type of petroleum-related uh or product or any any real physical object that has an organic uh component to it, once it combusts or burns, it is releasing PAHs into our environment. Um and then, you know, uh if you think about it, what what happens when we barbecue, when we barbecue food? Well, if you if you burn your your meats, you know, but during the the the the charring process, that that black that's created when you're burning your meat, uh that has PAHs in it, you know. So charred and and smoked and grilled type meat, uh, you know, you you're at risk of uh PAHs there, uh contamination in your food and uh from the smokes generated from doing that food. So other other, you know, uh man-made is you know, just even burning wood in fireplaces or you know, agricultural burns where they just burn things just to kind of you know regenerate the soil and burn the fields or the crop fields and stuff like that, or uh those any type again that you're you're burning something that's organic, you were going to be creating and releasing PAHs into our environment that is going to continue to spread. Um, and then you have your stuff, you know, man-made, of course, would be spills, right? You know, if we're we're using fossil fuels and petroleum products, you know, we we've uh you know brought it out of the ground and we're transporting it, and then and during that process, uh both those processes of bringing it out of the ground and transporting and the refining all are possibilities for spills, and spills are going to create opportunities for further spreading of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, PHs. So coal tars, uh, you know, crude oil, um any any type of petroleum that is you know, refined fuels that is burned, um, or wood or or you know, uh tobacco or the all these types of things are going to release um PAHs into our environment. And because of the fact that they are they have such a light weight associated with they're creates a very easy for them to move in our environment, and it's very hard for these things to to break down, so they persist in our environment for long periods of time, and that is what makes them uh such a big concern. Uh and again, they are compounds that have a lot of benzene rings in them, and benzene is a toxic chemical, and that is why you know they're such a contaminant of concern, and so um polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, PAHs, that is what the acronym stands for, and that's what it is. It are these uh literally thousands of uh compounds with a lot of benzene rings in them, and you know, it they are created from the incomplete combustion or burning of organic materials. So the ashes, the ashes from your fireplace, from burning wood, the ashes from coal burned in the barbecue pit, um you know, the ashes from forest fires, the ashes from house fires for that matter, volcanoes, the burning of garbage, the incombe uh incomplete burning of garbage, those ashes that are created have PAHs in them. And so and for that reason, I mean, any time that you're burning something, there's the possibility for spreading of the PAHs because uh they're so uh light in molecular weight, uh, as you would think of uh things that have burned, they got smaller in size and they turned to ash, and ash is very light, so it's very easy to move throughout our environment. Um so that is the reason why, and again, these are things that have been known to be cancer-causing carcinogens, and for that reason, they uh, you know, are a contaminative concern for our environment and for our human health and the health of our environment. So, you know, we just really need to be thinking about that and have the knowledge about that so that when we are trying to dispose of things um that we're cognitant to know that hey, I know that we just think this is ashes, and lots of people think let's just go throw this, you know, um use it for agricultural purposes and throw it in our dirt and stuff like that, to be thinking that you know there's actually contamination associated with those things that need to be have consideration. So, and these these aren't new, you know, these have been around, right? And it was in the 70s that uh 1970s that you know they really became a contaminant of concern because we had came up with the knowledge to know that PAHs and all the derivatives and the thousands of derivatives of um are carcinogens and you know can cause cancer. So it became a contaminant of concern and something that you know we need to be paying attention to. So they are literally everywhere, you know, they are literally everywhere, and so we just need to know that and do our best to uh keep them uh at bay, you know, uh keep our exposure to them as low as possible. Um and uh, you know, that way, because you know, high quantity uh exposure to PAHs have been known to cause cancer. So for that reason, we we need to just keep that in mind and uh know where PAs come from, what are the sources, and uh what we can do about it. And so that was the topic that I wanted to cover today is what does the acronym, what is what are PAHs, and again they're polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Poly meaning mini, uh cyclic meaning uh connected rings, so mini rings connected, mostly benzene oriented, aromatic, because uh aromatic uh benzene is an aromatic, and hydrocarbons because that's where they're derived from, and they've obviously got the H's and C's associated with them, the same as all other hydrocarbons. And so these are a special uh group of thousands of types of compounds that are known carcinogens, and for that reason they became a contaminant of concern that we need to, you know, be knowledgeable of. And uh, for that matter, uh, I should note that yes, uh Hambi Environmentals field test kit does detect and quantify uh PAHs the same as it does other hydrocarbons. So PAHs or polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons are just a family of hydrocarbons, and they're typically predominantly benzene-based, so lots of benzene rings in them. And so the easy way to think about them is think about them as ash uh and incomplete combustion or burning of organic materials and other petroleum type related uh materials. And so, with that, we keep in mind that you know pHs are not good for us, and uh it is something that needs to be on our mind, just like last week's topic of PCBs, and uh so it's PCBs, PAHs, uh PFAS, PFOS, these are all contaminants of concern that we're talking about from time to time. And you know, they are contaminants and they're things that we need to be concerned with because they are known uh contaminants of concern, and most of which are carcinogens, meaning they're cancer-causing. So, with that, I say, like I always do towards the end of the episodes, if you have a topic you'd like for us to address on a future podcast episode, or you have a specific question you'd like for us to address, just drop me a line at my email, which is C Fader, that's C Frank A-T-O-R, at let's talkremediation.com, and we will get that on a future podcast for you. I I thank you for tuning in today. Thank you, Hambi Environmental, for your ongoing support of this podcast, Let's Talk Remediation, where we're trying to have a positive impact on the environmental remediation industry. And with that, I'm your host, Charles Fader, and I'm out of the way.