Objective To assess exposure route-related health risks of dioxin emitted from a waste incineration plant among residents living around the plant in Beijing city.
Methods Referring to California's Hot Spot Program, we simulated the diffusion of dioxin emission in ambient air and in different environmental media around the waste incineration plant using American Meteorological Society (AMS) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Regulatory Model (AERMOD) . The doses of exposure to the dioxin emission through various routes were calculated for the residents living near the waste incineration plant to estimate the residents' lifetime cancer risk related to the exposures.
Results The lifetime cancer risk is 5.28 × 10–7 for the residents living at the place with maximum dioxin concentration via exposures to contaminated ambient air and soil and breastfeeding; while, the lifetime cancer risk is 1.77 × 10–8 for the residents with the drinking water from the five reservoirs potentially contaminated by the dioxin emission and consuming food products from farmland, livestock farms, and reservoirs surrounding the waste incineration plant.
Conclusion Under the current emission conditions, the dioxin emission-related health risk for the residents living around the waste incineration plant is within an ample safe margin and the main routes of exposure to the dioxin contamination are via respiration and breastfeeding for the residents.
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