Survey of Benzene and Other Toxic Organic Compounds in Air July 1996 - May 1999Date of publication: September 1999
Summary Report
Studies in 1996/97 and 197/98 (Stevenson and Narsey 1998, 1999) involved monitoring of benzene and other aromatic compounds at 31 sites, covering both outdoor and indoor environments in a range of urban and suburban zones in Auckland, Hamilton, Christchurch, Dunedin and Paeroa. Also, sampling and analysis of air for these compounds in motor vehicles while being driven was carried out in Auckland, Christchurch and Dunedin, and on State Highway 1 between Hamilton and Auckland. Overall annual average benzene exposures were estimated for a range of scenarios involving different exposure situations in which people spend their time, by calculating the time-and situation-weighted annual average concentrations, based on the annual average benzene concentrations found in this study. A "typical" New Zealand population exposure of 3 mg/m3 was estimated, and comparison of this with the WHO estimate of additional lifetime leukaemia risk suggested that, excluding exposures arising from smoking or environmental tobacco smoke, current exposures to benzene may result in up to 0.8 additional leukaemia deaths per year in the total New Zealand population.
The present study continues the 1996/97 and 1997/98 studies. The full report on the 1996-1999 study (Stevenson and Narsey, 1999) gives detailed information on which this summary report is based.
The present report discusses, briefly, approaches used in other countries to assess possible health impacts and to develop standards and targets for carcinogenic air pollutants, such as benzene. However, it makes no comment or recommendation about the acceptability of the benzene exposures found in the monitoring, except for providing some comparisons of those exposures with overseas guidelines or standards. The report makes no recommendations about what might be suitable parameters for any New Zealand standard or guideline for benzene concentrations in air. This would require consideration of a broader range of factors, including the environmental and health policy approaches of the Government. These matters are clearly beyond the scope of the present project, but are currently being considered under the Review of Ambient Air Guidelines being undertaken by the Ministry for the Environment in collaboration with the Ministry of Health. Nevertheless, the information and discussion presented may, within the limits of the study, provide information and some perspectives which may be useful in such broader considerations.
Document availability
This publication is not available in hard copy. It is only available on this website in PDF format below.
 (PDF,101 kB)
This publication has been converted to Adobe's Portable Document Format (PDF). Here is a link to information on downloading and viewing PDFs. |