[Stoves] WHO and 600,000 dead children

Andrew Heggie aj.heggie at gmail.com
Thu Nov 8 14:05:50 CST 2018


On Wed, 7 Nov 2018 at 22:54, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott
<crispinpigott at outlook.com> wrote:
>
> A person breathes a very convenient 10 cubic metres of air a day. Approximately. If the mass concentration of PM 2.5 in that air is 160 micrograms per cubic metre, then a typical adult will inhale 160 c 10 micrograms of )PM2.5. That is their inhalation: 1600 µg.


Thanks Crispin

OK that seems reasonable


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> A typical cigarette creates about 40 to 45 milligrams of PM2.5 (45,000 µg).  Sources very but the references I found were 40 to 45, with the latter being more common. So the cigarette-equivalence of that air (assuming they do not step indoors where air is probably cleaner than outside) is 1600/45,000 = 0.03555 cigarettes or 1/28.125. For a 60mm cigarette that would be 2.13mm of tobacco.

Again that looks good but I was looking for an attribution of the measurements


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> The claim for Delhi is “40 cigarettes per day” which is 1125 times more than the actual inhalation one might experience.  To reach the equivalent of 40 per day would require breathing air containing 180,000 µg/m3 for 24 hrs.
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 I wonder if this is the result of reporting the wrong units (as I
recently did with my little laser particulate counter) and subsequent
poor communication[1] and rounding as it is about the same 1000 fold
error that would result from confusing milligrams with micrograms.
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> The highest Fresh Air recorded in Kyrgyzstan last winter was 11,300 µg/m3 (48 hr average). That is appallingly bad. Another home reached 6000 and another 7000. 180,000 is impossible.
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> If someone tries to convince you that “air pollution is much more toxic than cigarette smoke” they are challenging the EPA’s assessment that all PM2.5 is equally toxic. If we open that Pandora’s box, we will find that particles differ strongly in their toxicity and effects on human health. Finding that out would put all the classification of “air pollution” constituents in doubt.  So anyone saying, “This smoke is worse than that smoke” will be resisted.
I hear you but as it stands in my understanding I think PM 2.5 from
combustion, whether it be engine exhaust, cigarette smoke or biomass
combustion is probably  similarly bad.

[1] We have a saying in UK that is no longer politically correct and
it derives from a game where one has to whisper a short sentence to
your neighbour without anyone else hearing, and the recipient then
whispers it to the next person and so on, the last person then says
the message out loud for the originator to see how it has been
contorted.

Andrew




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