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Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

bbc.com

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Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#131

Post by iamflimflam1 »

Symbiote wrote: post #89
bilekas wrote: post #21

> strongest evidence yet that local clean air zones could help reduce some of the harm caused by pollution during childhood. It's incredible this is even in debate. It's one of those intuitive things well known since the reduction of coal burning and smog during the industrial revolution in London?

The right (Conservative) and far right (Reform) parties both say they will abolish low-emission zones and other measures to reduce pointing traffic. They made it into a culture war topic.

The right latches onto anything where a small minority are upset and amplify it. They are the ultimate rage baiters.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#132

Post by adrianN »

mrob wrote: post #114
Aurornis wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Living very close to busy highways is known to generate poor air quality. I recommend anyone in those locations buy an air purifier for their kids' rooms. I bought a couple reasonably priced HEPA purifiers and I change the filters on schedule. Replacement HEPA filters are very cheap. Also watch out for things that we do indoors that can generate bad air quality. I had a friend who bought a VOC meter and noticed very…

HEPA filters are counterproductive in standard air purifiers. Air purifiers pump their cleaned air directly into the dirty air of the room. It doesn't matter if that cleaned air is extremely clean, because it's immediately mixed with dirty air. What actually matters is how much clean air you produce: the "clean air delivery rate" (CADR). The more effective the filter the more it restricts airflow. If a filter is only…

Any air purifier should be able to cycle the air in a normal room often enough that it should be quite clean in a short time.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#133

Post by Gigachad »

ecshafer wrote: post #3

Anecdata I was living very close to a busy highway, and my young daughter was wheazing when she had a cold, we had to give her medicine via a nebulizer. When we moved out to the country more, far away from any major roads, these issues all disappeared within a couple months.

NO2 is a very hazardous air pollutant which doesn’t get a ton of attention. The main sources are combustion engines and gas stoves. Asthma looks to be mostly caused by gas stoves.

I’ve got a sensor that can detect no2 and it noticeably spikes when using gas. Switched to induction after that.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#134

Post by tallanvor »

mrob wrote: post #114
Aurornis wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Living very close to busy highways is known to generate poor air quality. I recommend anyone in those locations buy an air purifier for their kids' rooms. I bought a couple reasonably priced HEPA purifiers and I change the filters on schedule. Replacement HEPA filters are very cheap. Also watch out for things that we do indoors that can generate bad air quality. I had a friend who bought a VOC meter and noticed very…

HEPA filters are counterproductive in standard air purifiers. Air purifiers pump their cleaned air directly into the dirty air of the room. It doesn't matter if that cleaned air is extremely clean, because it's immediately mixed with dirty air. What actually matters is how much clean air you produce: the "clean air delivery rate" (CADR). The more effective the filter the more it restricts airflow. If a filter is only…

If the purifier can filter the air more quickly than air leaves the room it'll still reduce the amount of pollutants in the air. Most people aren't going to create a "clean side" and "dirty side" setup for filtering the air in a room.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#135

Post by walthamstow »

mrec wrote: post #110
glenngillen wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've not lived in London for more than a decade. I always thought the black snot was from the Tube. Is it not?

Yup, especially on the older lines (Northern, Victoria, Jubilee, Bakerloo). Particulate pollution can be two orders of magnitude higher than at street level. This tends to be glossed over when trumpeting the success of ULEZ measures pushing people away from cars and onto public transport, and I say that as a non-car-owner.

People tend to walk 10-15 mins at either end when taking the tube, and will walk more through the day. My understanding is this activity is net positive despite the extra particulates while on the tube. I might be misremembering this with a study I read on cycling in road pollution though

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#136

Post by afiori »

tony69 wrote: post #41
energy123 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a dumping ground for poor people.

It’s not like they do it on purpose rubbing hands

Woke activists love the word "systemic" for a reason.

If a bunch of good people acting in good faith produce a result an evil mastermind would want does it matter if they are good? On many levels obviously yes, on some practical levels the system and the incentives still need to change.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#137

Post by lazide »

alex0015 wrote: post #124
weird-eye-issue wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's even the point of this comment?

The parent and thread seemed to be arguing that low cost housing was intentionally built in places that disadvantaged the people who lived there.

Or, the only places to build houses with reasonable costs are in areas that weren’t already built out with very expensive houses.

Which will tend to be less desirable areas, by definition.

One approach, of course, would be to also make existing houses less expensive/desirable. Notably, wealthy people tend to have the resources to fight efforts to do that.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#138

Post by adrianN »

itsyonas wrote: post #97
herbst wrote: post #92

When I talk about health implications I often end up saying "but it's less bad than living next to a street" which statistically many things we spend time optimizing about are. However most people live next to a busy street ...

The street isn't the problem. Cars and trucks are. If those streets were filled with people walking, cycling, etc., the health penalty of living next to one would vanish overnight.

A street full of EVs in a traffic jam is also pretty good. No exhaust pollution and low tire wear due to low speeds and low acceleration.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#139

Post by enquirewithin »

mrob wrote: post #114
Aurornis wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Living very close to busy highways is known to generate poor air quality. I recommend anyone in those locations buy an air purifier for their kids' rooms. I bought a couple reasonably priced HEPA purifiers and I change the filters on schedule. Replacement HEPA filters are very cheap. Also watch out for things that we do indoors that can generate bad air quality. I had a friend who bought a VOC meter and noticed very…

HEPA filters are counterproductive in standard air purifiers. Air purifiers pump their cleaned air directly into the dirty air of the room. It doesn't matter if that cleaned air is extremely clean, because it's immediately mixed with dirty air. What actually matters is how much clean air you produce: the "clean air delivery rate" (CADR). The more effective the filter the more it restricts airflow. If a filter is only…

A reasonable compromise is achieved by an air purifier that has the outlet on top because it’s blowing the filtered air well away from the inlet side and generally circulates the air in the room.

I used to work in the cleanest room in the state, that wasn’t a lab, back when I lived in Adelaide, and top-inlet button-outlet in a raised floor data centre is how the air handling units in the main data hall worked, so you can simulate that to a certain extent.

> The more effective the filter the more it restricts airflow.

This isn’t the whole story. Surface area and flow rate are factors.

A residential home is aiming to improve air quality, rather than grow flawless silicon ingots etc.

Re: Children's stunted lungs show recovery in ultra low emission zone

#140

Post by itsyonas »

herbst wrote: post #98
itsyonas wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The street isn't the problem. Cars and trucks are. If those streets were filled with people walking, cycling, etc., the health penalty of living next to one would vanish overnight.

Ok that's not what I consider a "busy street" but I get your point, need better wording there.

Why not? A lot of streets often seem busy simply due to the incredible space inefficiency of cars. What I like to do sometimes, when I wait at a traffic light with my bicycle, is to count the actual number of cars that cross during a phase. The amount feels large, but when you count, it's often not more than the amount of cyclists that cross in the next phase, and they take up just a tiny fraction of what cars need.
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