Annual production and molecular weight as an influential factor for environmental distribution of chemicals — a case study in Japan

Hydrophobic chemicals of lower molecular weight tend to partition to the atmosphere, and of higher molecular weight to the sediment. On the other hand, hydrophilic chemicals mainly go to the hydrosphere, where they are distributed between water and sediment. This distribution is subject to the adsorptivity of chemicals. Molecular weight which has close relations to adsorptivity was used as an indicater of sedimental affinity of chemicals, and a good correlationship was found between the products of (production) ∗ (molecular weight) and sedimental concentrations of chemicals, with good correlation coefficients (0.8 ∼ 0.9) for chemicals with each functional group.