Monitoring of the light absorption coefficient in Santiago de Chile and comparison with aerosol and elemental carbon mass

A compact, automated system has been built to measure the optical absorption coefficient of the air. It has been used to monitor the absorption coefficient for a period of more than a year in a central area of Santiago. Our results show a strong correlation with the daily traffic pattern, with the highest value during the morning rush hour (7.00 - 8.00 Hrs,), We have also measured PM-10, and elemental carbon mass simultaneously with the absorption coefficient. The Pearson correlation factor was calculated between these variables, The highest values were obtained between the absorption coefficient and elemental carbon (up to 0.95). A proportional factor between the absorption coefficient and mass was also obtained for the period studied