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Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

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Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#51
post #46

No mention of ozone. The more directly dangerous 254nm UV light has the advantage that it doesn't create ozone. Viruses and bacteria aren't the only bad things you don't want in your air. Ozone is thought to be a carcinogen in its own right and aggravate the health effects of particulate pollution. We want filtering and air circulation anyway, we don't want anything that makes it worse. The consumer electronics indus…

> things that make our problems worse, such as ultrasonic humidifiers, or ionizing air purifiers What is bad about these?

Ultrasonic humidifiers require ridiculously clean water. Even regular distilled water is scarcely clean enough. You need to clean the water tank ridiculously well, ridiculously often. No one actually uses an ultrasonic humidifier like it's "supposed" to be used. When the water isn't industrially clean, everything dissolved in it is turned very efficiently into tiny particles. You'll get a fine white mineral dust everywhere.

Ionizing air purifiers make ozone and the makers claim either that it's a good thing or that it's too little to worry about. The first is wrong, the second is a bad sell because the thing it's supposed to be removing is also (by itself) not a big health risk on any single day; the health benefit from removing particles is likely eaten up by the negative health effects of the ozone. You can clean air without ionization, so why? As far as I can tell, it's a pure marketing gimmick, the need to seem high-tech outweighs the actual utility of the thing. (That's also probably why ultrasonic humidifiers are popular, you can see the fog)

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#52
post #6

I have worked on such systems at Signify: There are numerous barriers to wider adoption except for very high risk situations. For instance: there have yet to be lawsuits to determine the risk of exposing people to UV. As you see in the comments below, any "UV" is considered dangerous by people not aware of the biological effects of various wavelenghts. Besides this, excimer lamps have a low expected lifetime, of both…

Yeah I saw a lamp for this and it had a proximity sensor to prevent overexposure. There's no way I'm buying a lamp that needs that to be safe. Especially if it's expensive and only lasts a year or two.

I am not convinced that far-UVC is safe for the skin and eyes. I suspect it will cause red spots on skin.

I would rather use it in an enclosed apparatus that has a fan to change its air, but only while measuring the ozone level sensitively.

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#53
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there are much simpler and more reliable ways to significantly reduce indoor air contaminents. one is a building method that produces a "floating" slab floor, that has a small gap around most of the walls, and the underfloor space is vented upwards with a chimney, this creates a small but continious air current that removes most dust and other things in the air. And then the simple expedient of useing radiant heat so…

Your first paragraph is advocating for ventilation, which is great but there's been so much incentive to reduce building energy consumption (heating/cooling) that recirculating, filtration and other technologies have resulted in offices becoming almost sealed off. We are now moving towards more balanced models as people don't feel comfortable in such offices e.g. sick building syndrome.

my description is a bare outline, actusl instalation could easily include a heat exchanger, and by going to radiant heat, it's surfaces that provide the heat,ie: floors (warm/cool feet) and walls, cielings, with humidity controll bieng done in air HCAC is decidedly unsexy engineering, but it can effect, all of every day so worth a bit of attention

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#55
post #6

I have worked on such systems at Signify: There are numerous barriers to wider adoption except for very high risk situations. For instance: there have yet to be lawsuits to determine the risk of exposing people to UV. As you see in the comments below, any "UV" is considered dangerous by people not aware of the biological effects of various wavelenghts. Besides this, excimer lamps have a low expected lifetime, of both…

Is there any reason why they can't just be installed inside air purifiers/ventilation? Especially since you could probably get more mileage out of the same amount of light energy by forcing the air through a narrower passage, since only airborne particles are actually going to absorb any energy anyway, and air is mostly just empty air.

The risk is that they generate ozone, and it's not clear how serious the risks of constant exposure to ozone are.

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#56

Wont micro-organisms quickly adapt and start producing UV resistant strains?

I always think of it as the equivalent of inner city youth evolving to be bulletproof

This is such a good analogy. There are some things that bacteria can evolve to deal with, like training yourself to build up an immunity to iocane powder. There are some things they cant, like training yourself to be bulletproof.

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#57
post #6

I have worked on such systems at Signify: There are numerous barriers to wider adoption except for very high risk situations. For instance: there have yet to be lawsuits to determine the risk of exposing people to UV. As you see in the comments below, any "UV" is considered dangerous by people not aware of the biological effects of various wavelenghts. Besides this, excimer lamps have a low expected lifetime, of both…

Every year our HVAC company tries to sell us UV lights for the HVAC system. They claim it's only about $1500 to install. Are these snake oil?

You gotta make sure they install them right. The UV light can degrade the insulation on wires, or break down expensive HEPA or bag filters.

If they put the light in the wrong place it can mess your equipment up.

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#58
post #6

I have worked on such systems at Signify: There are numerous barriers to wider adoption except for very high risk situations. For instance: there have yet to be lawsuits to determine the risk of exposing people to UV. As you see in the comments below, any "UV" is considered dangerous by people not aware of the biological effects of various wavelenghts. Besides this, excimer lamps have a low expected lifetime, of both…

Every year our HVAC company tries to sell us UV lights for the HVAC system. They claim it's only about $1500 to install. Are these snake oil?

After years of being a fly on the wall I signed up just to say: most of those things are closer to Radithor than snake oil.

There are only a few companies that sell those things at that price point (installed, $600-$800 for the unit), and they’re all so egregiously fraudulent that I strongly considered doing the leg work for a class action lawsuit.

I got the same pitch a few years ago, but as their bad luck would have it I actually worked on a UV-C LED based germicidal system for years with the same goal in mind, albeit as a hobbyist. My focus was on the LED based variants, which dominates new residential products, so I can’t speak to other systems. That said, regardless of the technology a $1,500 UV-C germicidal HVAC system is a $1,500 MRI machine - no it isn’t.

I was extremely interested in how they managed to accomplish what I had deemed unreasonable with current technology, while also being about 1/4 the cost and 1/15th the power requirements. The latter magic claim is their biggest tell, since the power requirements are slapped on the box and the power supply itself. In this case it was ~17 watts. I’d estimated ~300w for a barely reasonable reduction of common pathogens, and that was based on trying to out-clever systems that used 700w+.

Long story short, I disassembled one of them and they’re regular blue-violet LEDs @ ~405nm, a ceramic fragrance diffuser (popular’ish air freshener in the 90’s) that they marketed as some kind of alien tech UV enhancer, and a high voltage ionizer buried deep in the housing. The last item was going to be my cause for action since they proudly claim zero ozone generation while including a device that is solely intended to produce it. Hilariously I actually had a box of the same ionizers and I think I paid $20 for two scoops of them. I believe they include it so they can technically say the device does indeed have some level of potentially measurable germicidal properties, whereas their purple LEDs would have zero. They never claimed the lights were what did it!

They try bank on a technicality and consumer confusion regarding the LEDs by being very careful to say “UV” on the box, not “UV-C”, and due to inefficiencies of not being a laser the spectral wings of ~405nm purple lights would accidentally qualify as emitting UV. I also think there’s probably a legal loophole that allows the minuscule amount of ozone being generated by the literal ozone generator to qualify as “zero” due to dilution, while still being “germicidal” (if they brush up against the electrodes), so they may be skirting the law there as well. I don’t think the totality of their attempt at legal shenanigans would hold up, but I can’t find any other rational explanation for their very specific design and marketing decisions.

That’s as far as I got with it, since I only had a couple hours to inspect the device, but that was more than enough to make up my mind. Final thought: even if they used enchanted technology that fell from space you may only need to consider the 6-8” wide device being installed directly in the ~18” airflow, and restricting it accordingly, to decide if you’d be happier with an external HEPA filter in a couple rooms instead.

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always think of it as the equivalent of inner city youth evolving to be bulletproof

This is such a good analogy. There are some things that bacteria can evolve to deal with, like training yourself to build up an immunity to iocane powder. There are some things they cant, like training yourself to be bulletproof.

Train yourself, no. Evolve it? Yes. But you'll need an awful lot of generations. Put a robot gun where everything has to come to drink--but it's an air rifle, calibrated to the point of maybe causing injury. Every year you raise the pressure by a tiny bit.

The reason you can't evolve bulletproofness is that it's an overwhelming force. You get evolution when you subject your target to something that only gives a partial kill.

Re: Germicidal UV could make airborne diseases as rare as those carried by water

#60
post #23

Idiotic and massively overlooks/underestimates how complex biology is. What about beneficial and neutral but important bacteria and viruses? "Air" is actually a complex soup of all types of things. This like applying HCl to a skin infection.

I doubt it would be a problem for the microbiome [1] but I would worry about the immune system. Would being inside in sterilized air all the time mean you can't go outside or into a forest without getting really sick? [1] but who am I, it would still be worthwhile to check obviously

That's not how the immune system works. Practice lets it learn how to fight specific bugs, it doesn't make it stronger overall.
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