Indoor Air Pollution & Health Problems

Post date: September 4th, 2011

Let’s take a look at how indoor air pollution affects you. All sorts of airborne particles are present in the air and can be detrimental to your health and especially if you are allergic to any of the particles as many people are.

Indoor air pollution is among the top five environmental health risks. One solution is to ventilate your home adequately. However, this isn’t always possible because of weather conditions or because of pollution in the outdoor air. If you are allergic to pollen, ventilation is not going to help you during the hayfever season.

A second solution is to clean the indoor air either using a whole house filtration system or portable room air purifiers.

A third solution is to remove sources in the home which produce pollutants. For example, you could remove furniture which is giving out formaldehyde.

Indoor air pollution: What Are The Causes?

There are two broad categories to consider:

Particulate matter
Gaseous pollutants

Let’s take a look at these two categories in detail.

Indoor Air Pollution: Particulate Matter

This includes such particles as dust, smoke,, pollen, animal dander, tobacco smoke, particles generated from combustion appliances such as cooking stoves, dust mites, dust mite wast products, mold, mold spores, bacteria and viruses.

The important point to realize is that there are these particles have very different sizes. This is very crucial when you want to know how to remove them. For your reference here are some of the particles sizes:

Room Dust	100-300
Dust Mites	100-300
Dust Mite Droppings	4-25
Cockroach Allergens	10-200
Pollens	0.006-1000
Pollen – Grass	30-40
Pollen – Trees	20-50
Pollen – Ragweed	15-20
Sub-Pollen Particles	4 and below
Sub-Pollen Particles Of Ragweed	0.4-0.5
Pet Allergens	0.5-20
Cat Allergens	0.1-5
Mold Spores	1-100
Wood Smoke	0.2-3
Tobacco Smoke	0.01-1
Pesticides & Herbicides	0.001
Viruses	0.002-0.04
Bacteria	0.2-20

Particulate matter can be removed by mechanical filters such as HEPA filters and by electrostatic air filters.

What you need to pay attention to is how small particles the filter can capture. You should also pay attention to the fact that even though you may be allergic to particles bigger than 10 microns, particles equal to or less than 10 microns (known as PM10) are definitely a health hazard because they can penetrate to the deepest parts of your lungs. These particles can increase asthma symptoms and cause or aggravate lung diseases like bronchitis.

Particles greater than 10 microns (referred to as supercoarse particles) don’t normally reach the lungs. But they can still affect your eyes and nose. Particles between 2.5 and 10 microns in size are referred to as PM10 and as coarse particles and can penetrate into the airways.

Particulates equal to or less than 2.5 microns are referred to as PM2.5 and as fine particles. These are the size of a larger bacteria. They can penetrate deep into the lungs.

Particulates equal to or less than 0.1 micron are referred to as PM0.1 and also as ultrafine particulates. These are the size of a virus and can enter the lungs unhindered.

The lighter the particle, the longer it will stay in the air before falling to the ground. PM10 can stay in the air for minutes or hours. PM2.5 can stay in the air for days or weeks. The smaller the particle the more is its potential for travelling further. A PM10 can travel between 100 yards and 30 miles. A PM2.5 can go up to hundreds of miles.

Indoor Pollution: Gaseous Pollutants

These come from two main sources:

From combustion processes such as gas cookers, vehicle exhaust and tobacco smoking
From building materials, furnishings and products like adhesives, paints, varnishes, cleaning products, pesticides, air fresheners, hair spray, perfumes and other volatile organic compounds.

The mechanical air filters cannot capture gaseous pollutants. Individual gas molecules are in the range 0.0002 to 0.001 microns.

Gaseous pollutants can be captured by adsorption using chemical air purifiers of which the most common is activated carbon. You need a large surface area for this to be effective. One pound of activated carbon has a surface area of roughly 125 acres. A good purifier will have pounds of carbon. Some units use a combination of carbon and potassium permanganate.

If you see the unit has a thin carbon filter, you can be sure it doesn’t have enough carbon to seriously filter gaseous pollutants and volative organic compounds.

What are the health problems cause by indoor air pollution?

There are both short term effects and long term effects. Short term effects are problems like allergies which seem to become more and more common. Even people aren’t allergic can be irritated by pollutants in the air. Their eyes, nose and throat can become irritated.

Longer term effects are as serious as lung cancer and heart disease. A lot depends on the actual pollutants. The effects of tobacco smoke in causing lung cancer are well known. A lot of research is taking place at present into the effects on health of the very small particles and gaseous pollutants which cause indoor air pollution.