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Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

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Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#141

Post by vmchale »

hguant wrote: post #91
dghughes wrote: post #83

I'm in southeastern Canada years ago smoke from Quebec forest fires made the sky red. The soil where I am from is also red. It was like living on Mars. The fun ends quickly when your throat gets scratchy and there is no where you can go to escape it the air in your house has to come from outside too. I'm not looking forward to any smoke now my dad has COPD, IPF, is on oxygen, and he's elderly. If we get any amount of…

>I'm not looking forward to any smoke now my dad has COPD, IPF, is on oxygen, and he's elderly. If we get any amount of smoke here it will be the end of him. It's hard enough trying to keep him from contracting SARS-Cov-2 and developing covid-19 Seriously, get a HEPA rated air filter. Speaking as someone who has some serious lung issues, it's literally life changing/saving. Honeywell sells a number of models, cost is…

My 2c is that they will be popular the way hand sanitizer once was, I could see shortages so the earlier you get your order the better!

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#142

Post by jrockway »

gkop wrote: post #119
Scoundreller wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or in a pinch, a HEPA vacuum cleaner. Double points if you rig it to take in outside air and vent it inside to create a positive pressure of filtered air. This should work.

Would you say more about the double points idea? Our Coway is struggling to filter our small apartment just recirculating air. It would be amazing to be able to bring in filtered cool outside air, but I haven’t found any HEPA purifiers on the market with an intake hose or window mount (short of a permanent HVAC).

IQAir sells kits for directing the intake or output of their air filters to a vent. It's super expensive and obviously aimed at commercial customers, but I'm sure they'll sell it to you.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#143

Post by ogre_codes »

Seeing this first hand here near Eugene. Weather app has said mid 80s, I go outside and it's in the mid-low 60s and I need a hoodie.

Our local fire crews say this completely crappy weather/ unhealthy air is slowing the fire down so they can increase containment. Going stir crazy, but also this fire scared the hell out of most people so it's hard to complain too much about lingering fog/ chilly days.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#144

Post by Scoundreller »

gkop wrote: post #119
Scoundreller wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or in a pinch, a HEPA vacuum cleaner. Double points if you rig it to take in outside air and vent it inside to create a positive pressure of filtered air. This should work.

Would you say more about the double points idea? Our Coway is struggling to filter our small apartment just recirculating air. It would be amazing to be able to bring in filtered cool outside air, but I haven’t found any HEPA purifiers on the market with an intake hose or window mount (short of a permanent HVAC).

Take HEPA equipped vacuum cleaner. Put nozzle outside to suck in outside air. Put main unit inside to exhaust filtered air inside.

Seal window crack however which way you can. Tape and a block of wood with a 3” circular hole? Voilà.

Might be a good idea to pre-filter nozzle air to keep your HEPA for the small stuff.

And have a good stock of replacement vacuum filters. And earplugs...

Energy auditors will install a “fan door” to build pressure inside your home to smoke-test for air leaks. This is the same concept, except filtering the incoming air and helping to ensure your air-leaks are 1-way: out.

But this is all no competition for a stiff wind.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#145

Post by gkop »

Scoundreller wrote: post #144
gkop wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you say more about the double points idea? Our Coway is struggling to filter our small apartment just recirculating air. It would be amazing to be able to bring in filtered cool outside air, but I haven’t found any HEPA purifiers on the market with an intake hose or window mount (short of a permanent HVAC).

Take HEPA equipped vacuum cleaner. Put nozzle outside to suck in outside air. Put main unit inside to exhaust filtered air inside. Seal window crack however which way you can. Tape and a block of wood with a 3” circular hole? Voilà. Might be a good idea to pre-filter nozzle air to keep your HEPA for the small stuff. And have a good stock of replacement vacuum filters. And earplugs... Energy auditors will install a “f…

Earplugs! Good call.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#146

Post by jschwartzi »

hguant wrote: post #91
dghughes wrote: post #83

I'm in southeastern Canada years ago smoke from Quebec forest fires made the sky red. The soil where I am from is also red. It was like living on Mars. The fun ends quickly when your throat gets scratchy and there is no where you can go to escape it the air in your house has to come from outside too. I'm not looking forward to any smoke now my dad has COPD, IPF, is on oxygen, and he's elderly. If we get any amount of…

>I'm not looking forward to any smoke now my dad has COPD, IPF, is on oxygen, and he's elderly. If we get any amount of smoke here it will be the end of him. It's hard enough trying to keep him from contracting SARS-Cov-2 and developing covid-19 Seriously, get a HEPA rated air filter. Speaking as someone who has some serious lung issues, it's literally life changing/saving. Honeywell sells a number of models, cost is…

If you have central heat you can sometimes configure the thermostat to run the blower separately from the heating element. This creates a nice positive pressure environment. If you have a MERV 10 or better filter installed on the furnace then it's actually pulling in filtered air, as any high enough MERV filter will filter PM2.5 with a decent efficiency. I think they start filtering PM2.5 at about MERV 10, and by MERV 13 they're filtering 90% or more of PM2.5.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#148

Post by cactus2093 »

bthallplz wrote: post #69
derwiki wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been using an app that converts AQI to equivalent cigarettes smoked per day. It’s not perfect but it’s something I can wrap my head around as a meaningfully bad number.

Here's one such app, for people that are interested: https://shootismoke.app It's currently giving me 2.3 cigarettes per day, and I live a decent distance away from any of the fires (Sacramento, CA).

Why in the world would this be a native app and not a web page?

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#149

Post by firethrowaway »

monkeynotes wrote: post #116
derefr wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isn’t the statistic I would expect to be pulled out here. Not all land area has any chance of catching/spreading a fire. Fires don’t really spread through rainforest; they definitely don’t spread through rocky areas; nor, really, through swampland; nor across mountain ranges; nor through irrigated cropland. (Nor through modern concrete cities, but city land-area is negligible.) There’s definitely some portion of…

I read it as less than 1% of all land that has burned this year. Not 1% of all land in the US. Can you imagine if 1% of the entire of the US burned!

There are 1.9 billion acres in the contiguous US, making 1% about 19 million acres.

a bad wildfire year is ~10 million acres or ~0.5% (https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/IF10244.pdf). It seems conceivable that we surpass that significantly this year.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#150

Post by amluto »

pmiller2 wrote: post #132
hguant wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm not looking forward to any smoke now my dad has COPD, IPF, is on oxygen, and he's elderly. If we get any amount of smoke here it will be the end of him. It's hard enough trying to keep him from contracting SARS-Cov-2 and developing covid-19 Seriously, get a HEPA rated air filter. Speaking as someone who has some serious lung issues, it's literally life changing/saving. Honeywell sells a number of models, cost is…

If you have COPD or other serious lung issues, don't get just one HEPA filter. These machines are rated to filter the air in an area that's certain number of square feet, based on how many CFM of air they move. Get at least enough of them that your whole living space is covered, and deploy them throughout the entire dwelling. You may want more individual machines so you can run them on a lower fan setting, which prod…

The area covered is somewhat useless — actual coverage depends hugely on how leaky the building is and how windy it is. The goal is to get enough air through filters that the incoming smoky air is diluted enough by filtered air to achieve a good average particle count.

A handheld particle counter helps a lot.

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