Abstract:Gas and particlephase samples of ambient air in four typical coke plants were analyzed for EPAs 16 prioritycontrolled polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) by gas chromatographymass spectrometry (GCMS). The total PAHs concentration ranges from 3.739 6 to 18.161 0 μg·m-3 with feature pollutant of benzo(a)pyrene from 0.008 9 to 0.099 8 μg·m-3. The concentration of PAHs decreases with the increase of coke oven height. The mean concentrations of naphthalene and phenanthrene are higher than those of other PAHs, while benzo(ghi)perylene is the lowest in the gasphase PAHs for four coke plants. The concentration of benzo(b)fluoranthene is the highest with the lowest anthracene concentration in particlephase. The concentration of gasphase PAHs is higher than that of particlephase PAHs, and the fraction of gasphase PAHs is 87.2% of the total ones. Coke plants should take action to control the emissions of naphthalene and phenanthrene. There is a perfect correlation between gas/particle partition coefficients and subcooled liquid vapor pressure of PAHs with R2 of 0.95 and mr of -0.52. Absorption is the main mechanism of gas/particle partitioning for PAHs in the atmosphere of coke plant.