El Niño driven haze over the Southern Malaysian Peninsula and Borneo

Md Firoz Khan; Ahmad Hazuwan Hamid; Haasyimah Ab Rahim; Khairul Nizam Abdul Maulud; Mohd Talib Latif; Mohd Shahrul Mohd Nadzir; Mazrura Sahani; Kai Qin; Prashant Kumar; Helena Varkkey; Mohammad Rashed Iqbal Faruque; Ng Chee Guan; Seyedeh Parisa Ahmadi; Sumiani Yusoff

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139091

El Niño driven haze over the Southern Malaysian Peninsula and Borneo

Sci Total Environ. 2020 Aug 15:730:139091. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139091. Epub 2020 Apr 30.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; School of Environment Science and Spatial Informatics, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, China; Institute of Ocean and Earth Environmental (IOES), University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur 50603, Malaysia. Electronic address: mdfirozkhan@um.edu.my.
² Institute of Climate Change, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia.
³ Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
⁴ Institute of Climate Change, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia; Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia.
⁵ Department of Earth Sciences and Environment, Faculty of Science and Technology, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia.
⁶ Environmental Health and Industrial Safety Program, School of Health and Applied Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Jalan Raja Muda Abdul Aziz, 50586 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
⁷ School of Environment Science and Spatial Informatics, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, China.
⁸ Global Centre for Clean Air Research, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences (FEPS), University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, United Kingdom.
⁹ Department of International and Strategic Studies, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur 50603, Malaysia.
¹⁰ Space Science Centre (ANGKASA), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 UKM, Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia.
¹¹ Institute of Ocean and Earth Environmental (IOES), University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur 50603, Malaysia.

PMID: 32413602
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139091

Abstract

The Southeast Asian (SEA) region is no stranger to forest fires - the region has been suffering from severe air pollution (known locally as 'haze') as a result of these fires, for decades. The fires in SEA region are caused by a combination of natural (the El Niño weather pattern) and manmade (slash-and-burn and land clearing for plantations) factors. These fires cause the emissions of toxic aerosols and pollutants that can affect millions of people in the region. Thus, this study aims to identify the impact of the SEA haze on the Southern region of the Malaysian Peninsula and Borneo region of East Malaysia using the entire air quality observation data at surface level in 2015. Overall, the concentration of PM₁₀ was about two-fold higher during the haze period compared to non-haze period. The concentrations of CO, flux of CO and flux of BC were aligned with PM₁₀ during the entire observation period. The wind field and cluster of trajectory indicated that the Southern Malaysian Peninsula and Borneo were influenced mainly from the wildfires and the combustion of peat soil in the Indonesian Borneo. This study finds that wildfires from Borneo impacted the Southern Malaysian Borneo more seriously than that from Sumatra region.

Keywords: Aerosol; Biomass burning; Haze; Peatland fires; Trace gases; Wild Forest fires.