Handheld two-stroke engines as an important source of personal VOC exposure for olive farm workers

Personal exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) is mainly associated with indoor exposures; however, elevated short-term exposures may also occur during ambient activities. Handheld two-stroke gasoline-powered engines have widespread use in agriculture, but so far, no studies have been conducted on the potential health risks due to the inhalation of emitted VOCs. A one-week passive sampling has been conducted on olive farm workers during the harvesting season to monitor personal exposure levels to VOCs. The first group of workers was selected to represent the contribution of gasoline-powered shaker to daily personal VOC exposures, and one another group of workers was selected as the control, whose have not been using the device. Higher concentrations of 1-pentene, n-hexane, isopentane, n-pentene, and toluene were observed in personal samples collected from machine operators. Personal exposure concentrations of a total of 45 monitored VOCs varied between 29.2 ± 10.7 and 3733.4 ± 3300.1 µg m^-3 among 20 volunteer workers. Estimated carcinogenic risks were between the acceptable levels of 10^-4 and 10^-6 for all workers. All individual chronic HQs and HIs (as the sum of individual HQs) were below the benchmark value of 1 for regular workers in 3 different sampling sites, whereas HI values in both acute (short term) and chronic exposure scenarios were exceeded 1 for shaker machine operators. This represented potential non-carcinogenic health hazards for exposed shaker operators, along with elevated VOCs.