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From Outside to Inside Coal-Tar Pavement Sealant Linked to PAHs in House Dust House dust is an important source for human AiabL O exposure to many contaminants, including PAHs. i This is particularly true for small children,who spend ► s.t mg/kg 129 mg/kg time on the floor and put their hands and objects into ❑ ❑ ❑ ❑ ❑ ❑ ❑ ❑ their mouths. In 2008,the USGS measured PAHs ❑ ❑ ❑ ❑ in house dust from 23 ground-floor apartments and 1 1 in dust from the apartment parking lots. Apartments oc oaf-raaealcoar c=al-tarsealcoat with parking lots with coal-tar-based sealcoat had PAH concentrations in house dust that were 25 times higher, on average, than concentrations in house dust 9.0 mg/kg 4,760 mg/kg from apartments with parking lots with other surface Apartments with coal-tar-based sealcoat on the parking lot had types (concrete,unsealed asphalt, and asphalt-based much higher concentrations of PAHs,both in indoor dust and sealcoat). PAH concentrations in the dust from the in parking lot dust,than apartments with an unsealed asphalt parking lots with coal-tar-based sealcoat were 530 or concrete parking lot or with a parking lot with asphalt based sealcoat.Concentrations shown are for the sum of the 16 U.S. times higher, on average, than concentrations on the Environmental Protection Agency priority pollutant PAHs(Mahler parking lots with other surface types. and others,2010),in milligrams per kilogram(mg/kg). There are no U.S. health-based guidelines for chronic exposure to PAHs in house dust. The only ik, r existing guideline is for a single PAH—benzo[a]- pyrene—issued by the German Federal Environment Br Agency Indoor Air Hygiene Commission (Hansen A and Volland, 1998). The guideline advises minimiz- " ing exposure to concentrations of benzo[a]pyrene `,. ,' greater than 10 mg/kg in dust to avoid adverse health effects. That guideline was exceeded for 4 of the , 11 apartments with coal-tar-sealcoated parking lots VIOL and for 1 of the 12 apartments with a parking lot with a different surface type. Also of concern is expo- sure to the sealcoated pavement surfaces themselves through play activities. Dust on some of the seal- Photograph obtained from Jupiter Images. coated parking lots had a concentration of benzo[a]- pyrene that was more than 50 times higher than the What about other sources of PAHs?Although German guideline. tobacco smoking, candle and incense burning, and Is IPPP- 400 barbecue and fireplace use have been suggested to affect PAH concentrations in house dust, this study found no relation between any of these, or the many other factors considered, and PAH concentrations in rk the house dust. The presence or absence of coal-tar- based sealcoat on the apartment complex parking lot strongly correlated with PAH concentrations in house dust; the only other variable that was related to PAH concentrations in house dust was urban land-use intensity(the percentage of land near the apartment dedicated to multifamily residential,commercial, office, warehouse, or streets) (Mahler and others, 2010). Photograph courtesy of CLEARCorps,Durham,North Carolina.