Emissions from aircraft that use leaded aviation gasoline are a significant source of environmental pollution in neighborhoods near regional airports, a new study by researchers at Oregon State University and Portland State University has found.
Emissions from aircraft that use leaded aviation gasoline are a significant source of environmental pollution in neighborhoods near regional airports, a new study by researchers at Oregon State University and Portland State University has found.
Lead levels were much higher near two Portland, Oregon-area regional airports than urban areas located farther away, and the dominant source of the lead is aviation fuel, said Alyssa Shiel, an environmental geochemist at Oregon State University, and one of the study’s corresponding authors.
“While lead was phased out of motor vehicle gasoline decades ago, piston-engine aircraft - small planes such as single-engine trainers, light twin-engine planes, agricultural crop-dusters and vintage war planes -remain the largest remaining source of airborne lead emissions in the country,” said Shiel, an associate professor in OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences.
Read More: Oregon State University
A small plane sits at an airport. (Photo Credit: Michelle Klampe, Oregon State University)
