Effectiveness and diurnal variations of vegetative environmental buffers (VEBs) for mitigating NH₃ and PM emissions...

Air pollutants from poultry production, such as ammonia (NH₃) and particulate matter (PM), have raised concerns due to their potential negative impacts on human health and the environment. Vegetative environmental buffers (VEBs), consisting of trees and/or grasses planted around poultry houses, have been investigated as a mitigation strategy for these emissions. Although previous research demonstrated that VEBs can reduce NH₃ and PM emissions, these studies used a limited number of samplers and did not examine concentration profiles. Moreover, the differences between daytime and nighttime emissions have not been investigated. In this study, we characterized emission profiles from a commercial poultry house using an array with multiple sampling heights and explored the differences between daytime and nighttime NH₃ and PM profiles. We conducted three sampling campaigns, each with ten sampling events (five daytime and five nighttime), at a VEB-equipped poultry production facility. NH₃ and PM samples were collected downwind from the ventilation tunnel fans before, within, and after the VEB. Results showed that ground-level concentrations beyond the VEB decreased to 8.0% ± 2.7% for NH₃, 13% ± 4% for TSP, 13% ± 4% for PM₁₀, and 2.4% ± 2.8% for PM_2.5 of the original concentrations from the exhaust tunnel fan, with greater reduction efficiency during daytime than nighttime. Furthermore, pollutant concentrations were positively intercorrelated. These findings will be valuable for developing more effective pollutant remediation strategies in poultry house emissions.