October 24, 2012
Sarah Yang, UC Berkeley
Sarah Yang, UC Berkeley
Credit:
Are gasoline-fueled cars or large diesel trucks the bigger source of secondary organic aerosol (SOA), a major component of smog?
UC Berkeley researchers have stepped into this debate with a new study that says diesel exhaust contributes 15 times more than gas emissions per liter of fuel burned.
The study, published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, elucidates the contributions to air pollution from the two types of fuel emissions. The authors estimate that diesel exhaust is responsible for 65-90 percent of a region’s vehicular-derived SOA, depending upon the relative amounts of gasoline and diesel used in the area.
