Outdoor air pollution

Indoor air pollution in urban centers occurs both at the home and in the workplace. It can often pose a greater threat to human health than outdoor air pollution, both in developed and developing countries of the Asian region. In particular, women and young children from low-income households are often at significant risk from exposure to high concentrations of pollutants from cooking in poorly ventilated houses. 

Indoor Outdoor Air Pollution. An excellent general introduction to many aspects of air pollution, sponsored by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. http //www.lbl.gov/Education/ELSI/pollution-main.html. Accessed on September 1, 2006. 

Brickus, L. S. R., J. N. Cardoso, and F. R. De Quino Neto, Distributions of Indoor and Outdoor Air Pollutants in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Implications to Indoor Air Quality in Bayside Offices, Environ. Sci. Technol., 32, 3485-3490 (1998). 

Colome, S. D N. Y. Kado, P. Jaques, and M. Kleinman, Indoor-Outdoor Air Pollution Relations Particulate Matter Less Than 10 /Mill in Aerodynamic Diameter (PM 10) in Homes of Asthmatics, Atmos. Environ, 26A, 2173-2178 (1992). 

Other examples are carcinogenicity studies on complex mixtures (petroleum middle distillates, foundry fumes, pesticides, heterocyclic amines, diesel exhaust, and solid particles) neurotoxicity studies of mixtures of solvents alone or in combination with exposure to physical factors and toxicity stndies of outdoor air pollutants, focusing... 

Outdoor Air Pollution. Applications include monitoring neighborhoods near a small local source municipal incinerators photochemical smog episodes and their impact on outdoor athletics and recreation urban traffic congestion and dust resuspension from hazardous wastes. 

Mathematical exposure models applied to urban areas have been presented by Jensen [23], Kousa et al. [20] and Wu et al. [24]. The model presented by Jensen [23] is based on the use of traffic flow computations and the operational street pollution model (OSPM) for evaluating outdoor air pollutants concentrations in urban areas. The activity patterns of the population have been evaluated using... 

Flertel O, De Leeuw F, Raaschou-Nielsen O, Jensen S, Gee D, Herbarth O, PryorS, PalmgrenF, Olsen E (2001) Fluman exposure to outdoor air pollution - IUPAC Technical Report. Pure Appl Chem 73 933-958... 

Koponen IK, Asmi A, Keronen P, Puhto K, Kulmala M (2001) Indoor air measurement campaign in Helsinki, Finland 1999 - the effect of outdoor air pollution on indoor air. Atmos Environ 35 1465-1477... 

Fig. 15. Outdoor air pollution Average concentration of small particles (PM10) in outdoor urban air by WHO subregion (from WHO, 2004c).

Bobak M Leon DA (1999b) Pregnancy outcomes and outdoor air pollution An ecological study in districts of the Czech Republic 1986-8. Occup Environ Med, 56 539-543. 

Nakatsuka H, Watanabe T, Ikeda M, Hisamichi S, Shimizu H, Fujisaku S, Ichinowatari Y, Konno J, Kuroda S, Ida Y, Suda S, Kato K (1991) Comparison of the health effects between indoor and outdoor air pollution in north-eastern Japan. Environ Int, 17 51-59. 

Pande JN, Bhatta N, Biswas D, Pandey RM, Ahluwalia G, Siddaramaia NH, Khilnani GC (2002) Outdoor air pollution and emergency room visits at a hospital in Delhi. Indian J Chest Dis Allied Sci, 44 13-19. 

Outdoor air pollution studies on the effects of nitrogen dioxide in healthy adult humans do not conclusively show a relationship between ambient concentrations of nitrogen dioxide and respiratory effects. However, children and people with asthma appear to be at greater risk of respiratory effects. 

Cohen, A.J., Anderson, H.R., et al. (2005) The global burden of disease due to outdoor air pollution. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health-Part A-Current Issues,6S 13-14) 1301-1307. 

In general, a great deal more is known about the acute effects of ambient air pollutants than is known about the chronic effects. The following discussion will outline the findings of epidemiologic, controlled clinical and animal studies that have examined the adverse health effects of outdoor air pollutants. More detailed information can be found in the Further Reading section. 

Vineis P, Forastiere F, Hoek G, and Lipsett M (2004) Outdoor air pollution and lung cancer Recent epidemiologic evidence. International Journal of Cancer 111(5) 647-652. 

The smallest spatial scale at which outdoor air pollution is of concern corresponds to the air volume affected by pollutant chemical emissions from a single point source, such as a smokestack (Fig. 4-24). Chemicals are carried downwind by advection, while turbulent transport (typically modeled as Fick-ian transport) causes the chemical concentrations to become more diluted. Typically, smokestacks produce continuous pollutant emissions, instead of single pulses of pollutants thus, steady-state analysis is often appropriate. At some distance downwind, the plume of chemical pollutants disperses sufficiently to reach the ground the point at which this occurs, and the concentrations of the chemicals at this point and elsewhere, can be estimated from solutions to the advection-dispersion-reaction equation (Section 1.5), given a knowledge of the air (wind) velocity and the magnitude of Fickian transport. 

Committee of the Environmental and Occupational Health Assembly of the American Thoracic Society. Health effects of outdoor air pollution. Am J Respir Crit Care Med 1996 153(1) 3-50. 

At times, people react acutely or chronically to unknown stimulants. In such cases, it is hypothesized that unidentified mixtures are often the causative agents. Such toxic mixtures can arise from mixtures of two or more household products as well as from the mixture of household chemicals with chemicals from foods, outdoor air pollutants, water pollutants, or industrial chemicals that are carried into the home on the clothing of workers. In many of these mixture exposure instances, the health effects cannot be attributed to any of the individual chemicals present, but produce distinct clinically defined symptoms. 

D Amato G, Liccardi G, D Amato M, Cazzola M. Respiratory allergic diseases induced by outdoor air pollution in urban areas. Monaldi Arch Chest Dis2002 57(3 4) 161 3. 

Evidence for health effects associated with exposure to smoke from combustion of biomass fuels was provided initially by studies on outdoor air pollution as well as by studies dealing with exposure to environmental tobacco smoke. Criteria documents for outdoor air pollutants published by the USEPA [ 13], for example, detail the effects of many components, including particulate matter, carbon monoxide, oxides of sulfur and nitrogen and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. 

---