Domestic activities and pm generation: a contribution to the understanding of indoor sources of air pollution

Abstract

Few researches on domestic indoor air pollution have given quantitative information on the variation of the characteristics of the indoor source of particulate matter (PM). The purpose of this work was to investigate the emission characteristics of the common indoor particle sources.More specifically, this paper is intended to contribute to the understanding of how normal domestic activities could affect the human health. The emission sources of PM studied in this work was cooking, vacuuming, ironing and the use of deodorant spray.Cooking activities were expected to be one of the major sources of indoor particles and the features of the cookers may affect the characteristics of emissions resulting from cooking. For this reason, the results of a previous study based on the variability of the power of the cooker were reported, to study the sustainability of natural gas from the point of view of the induced indoor human exposure to PM.Measurements were performed by a GRIMM analyser, able to measure 16 granulometric classes from 0.3 to 20 µm. The study found that the activity of cooking and the use of deodorant spray are the sources that produce the higher indoor concentration levels compared with the other sources studied.

Time-use in different rooms of selected New Zealand houses and the influence of plan layout

“…Weschler 1 believes that increases in the last few decades of use of personal computers, electronic games and even television have had a big effect on the overall time people spend at home indoors. The latter is proven to be linked with negative effects on occupant health due to possible higher exposure to pollutants [2][3][4] but there is also a need to know how long occupants spend in different rooms to understand their potential levels of exposure to indoor pollutants. This is especially important for studies that model the spread and effect of indoor pollutants rather than measuring them.…”

Towards the Sustainable Management of Air Quality and Human Exposure: Exemplary Case Studies

“…The time spent in indoor environments and the high concentrations that can be generated by various domestic activities make indoor exposure particularly influent on the total exposure of individuals. The main recognised sources of PM in confined environments are cigarette smoke, biomass burning for cooking and/or heating purposes and cooking itself, regardless of the used energy source [1], [2]. A study that focused on dwellings with smokers showed respectively 650% and 720% higher PM10 and PM 2.5 concentrations than dwellings without smokers [3].…”

CO2 MEASUREMENTS FOR UNCONVENTIONAL MANAGEMENT OF INDOOR AIR QUALITY

“…Contrarily to the outdoor space, indoor environments, if not adequately built, may contribute to increase the concentrations of air contaminants that comes from outside [9] or that are generated indoors, especially if the ventilation and the rate of exchange of the indoor air are weak. Indeed, similarly to outdoor environments, ventilation acts as the main dispersion mechanism in indoor spaces [10].…”