Do you know how silently indoor pollution kills households?

More than half of the population of Asia relies on burning of biomass fuel including wood, crop refuse, animal dung and heavy garbage to cook their food.

As a result smoke emits while they cook and it has many harmful gases including carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide that affect the respiratory system of households.

According to World Health Organisation nearly 2 million people die of this form of pollution every year and more than half of them are from poor regions of Asia and Africa.

Women are worst hit of indoor pollution

Womenfolk are the most vulnerable to this form of pollution because mostly they cook food. They have to be near to the fireplace for hours that keep emitting smokes.

Secondly little girls are equally most vulnerable to it. In conservative societies of poor regions they are not allowed to go out from home without any reason. As a result most of the diseases related to indoor pollution are reported in women and girls in Asia and Africa.

China’s move to ban barbecue for air pollution control raises eyebrows worldwide

The city administration of Beijing has decided to ban unlicensed and unsafe barbecue roadside skewers across the city for air pollution control. Roadside eateries are quite common in big cities of China because traditional Chinese foods need not so lengthy cooking that is why it is easy to cook it standing on roadside and sell it to commuting people who love to eat while standing. Most of such food is stir fried and offered in bowls with lot of yummy sauces that needs to be eaten with chopsticks or forks. However, after popularity of roasted meat of all type with a touch of sizzler that makes noise and smoke together the barbecue or grilled food is also getting equally popular.

In a recent move - after publication of critical reports across the world about the rising level of air pollution in China - the city administration of Beijing has announced to take action against those barbecue stalls that

How to save your kids from diabetes because of air pollution?

The chances of diabetes in kids because of their being exposed to air pollution are more than normal situation and they may suffer from this silent-killer type of disease after growing up. The recent finding released by Diabetologia, the Journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes says that exposure of kids to polluted air enhances the risk of their resistance to insulin, a vivid warning sign of diabetes. It was confirmed after making experiment on nearly 400 children.

It may be pointed out that the main cause of diabetes is too high blood-sugar level in the human body. Basically there are two types of diabetes. One is type 1 that occurs when a human body fails to produce insulin which is actually a hormone that converts blood sugar into energy. While the type 2 diabetes is the state in body when it can’t produce sufficient insulin or may resist to its effects.

Another fatal harm of traffic pollution discovered

There is another lethal harm of traffic pollution is discovered quite recently. If you stay for a longer period of time daily in traffic pollution it is more likely that you suffer from severe heart attack because of your exposure into it. Earlier this type of pollution carried risk of making us suffer from asthma, throat infection, eyes irritation, weakening of our nervous system, migraine pain, giddying and problems in our arterial system. But a recent study added another confirm harm into already a lengthy list of hazards of traffic pollution that may take our life if prompt precautionary measures are not taken well before the appearance of its signs.

Recent study

The recent study was conducted by Dr Hagen Kalsch from West-German Heart Center in Essen, Germany actually aimed to find that out of noise and particulate matter which element of traffic pollution hits most at the heart of human beings who are under its exposure.

Top 5 reasons of air pollution in Asia

Either it is China, Iran, India, Pakistan or any other Asian country of same level, there is one common problem in all of them. They fail to control air pollution. Media is replete with horrendous stories of the effects of air pollution in such countries. Not mega cities but their small towns are also suffering from this menace. Just cast a look over the densely populated area of China you can see every second person wearing breathing mask especially during winter when fog and air emissions make lethal smog pollution.

Some parts of the Asia are developing rapidly especially eastern countries like Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and Indonesia but they also don’t have a strong pollution control system. Their development strategy no doubt fully takes care of environment but it is not old enough to offset the pollution created prior to this strategy. Broadly speaking there are 5 reasons of air pollution in Asia.

Outdoor games to pause in China if air pollution rises more

Did you ever hear this type of the harms of air pollution? What if you are not allowed to play games because you may inhale a lot of polluted air while playing? This happened in China where owing to rising level of air contamination its sportspersons may be forbidden to play till it reduces back.

Yes believe me I am not kidding. Owing to the alarmingly rising level of air pollution in China the city government of its capital Beijing issued a warning to the sportspersons of the metropolis. They are directed not to play if contaminants in the air increase to the level of 500 particles.

Air pollution shot up in China

Right now the air pollution in Beijing is ranging from 176 to 442 as recorded on 12^th January 2013. Its level is considered not harmful if it is near about 50. If it crosses the level of 300 it becomes more dangerous to human life. Its escalating level promptly affects the people’s health by causing eye irritation, migraine, asthma, throat infection, skin allergy and respiratory disease including the deadly lung cancer in people. If people have to breathe fast because of a workout or sports they would be more vulnerable to this menace.

Traffic pollution makes our kids unsocial by nature

A recent study revealed that due to the traffic pollution the chances of disorder in a to-be-born baby increased because of its exposure to the vehicular emissions that are already present in the respiratory system of the pregnant mother which she inhaled.

According to the study conducted by a group of scientists of California USA, the harmful effects of the traffic pollution lead the child to autism that is a habit of living isolated with limited activities. It also develops stereo-typed behavior in affected person’s every work be it a job, study or household work.

Study said the children in direct exposure to the high level of the traffic pollution are in three-time risk of suffering from such behavior than those who live in the low-traffic areas. However, the bad ambient air quality does not impair the brain. It only brings on psychological imbalances in kids.

Top 3 unnoted effects of air pollution

Do you live in an area where air pollution is high? If yes then your mental age is three years more than your real age. Yes really it is. We know older we are the slower is our thinking process. It means a person inhaling polluted air thinks slowly than people of his or her equal age living in the less-polluted air.

Air pollution makes us three years older

It is not my estimates. It is a study recently revealed by University of South California. According to this study, the air pollution makes our mind power weaker.  It further disclosed that older people are more vulnerable to the harmful effects of air pollution than the younger ones. Their weakening body system receives more hit of polluted air which goes through their body to affect their respiratory system more particularly. Our survival depends upon smooth functioning of our respiratory system.

Carbon trading or license to pollute?

Carbon trading means permitting an industry to emit certain amount of smoke and if it does so less it is allowed to sale the permissibility of the rest amount of emissions to any other industry on a price as quoted by the buyer which means this transaction takes place in a carbon trading exchange.  An exchange is market mechanism where already sold products are resold on agreed price. It is also called emissions trading which was adopted by industrialized nations after Kyoto protocol - an international agreement binding the developed nations to reduce their carbon emissions by 5.2% till 2012.

Atmospheric pollution and our kids

It was rightly said by someone that if you can’t give clean air to breathe to your kids, the fortunes and fortunes for them would be insufficient to make them happier and healthier. We in our whole life put our every effort to raise our standard of living and save a lot to leave for our kids but forget the bitter reality of leaving behind a more polluted world for our coming generation to keep ailing in it.

The atmospheric pollution is the main hurdle to let us breathe clean air because it does not leave a modicum of air free from pollutants. When various gases harmful for the consumption of human and other living beings exceed in quantity in ambient air it is called the atmospheric pollution. We can avoid several types of pollution by adopting different precautionary measures but we can’t keep ourselves safe from the polluted air because our very survival is almost impossible without the air – clean or polluted – we have to breathe.

Types of air pollutants

There are two types of air pollutants which contaminate the air. One is primary air pollutants comprising of sulphur dioxide (SOx), nitrogen oxide (NOx), carbon monoxide (CO) and carbon dioxide (CO2) which are generated as a result of any kind of combustion and mostly being emitted by vehicles and industries. Apart from them volatile organic compounds (VOCs), particulate matter, toxic metals particles, chlorofluorocarbons, ammonia and odour if found in the air more than the permissible limit will be quite harmful for both living beings and environment. All of these elements are called primary pollutants.

The secondary air pollutants are particulate matter formed from gaseous primary pollutants and compounds in photochemical smog, ground level ozone (O3) formed from NOx and VOCs, peroxyacetyl nitrate (PAN) - generated from NOx and VOCs and various minor pollutants mostly created from indoor pollution during the process of burning of fireplace and smoke emission during the cooking.

Causes of atmospheric pollution

Most of the atmospheric pollution is the result of the vehicular and industrial emissions if released in excess of prescribed limits as set under environmental quality standards. Every country has its own set of air quality standards but as we know the ambient air is not the property of any country nor has it any specific culture. Its immune system is also uniform across the world. Therefore, most of the air quality standards of every country of the world are same. Unfortunately many countries especially the poor ones have yet to develop their own air quality standards and still following those set by global organisations like World Health Organisation.

Effects of atmospheric pollution

When we relate the prevailing atmospheric pollution with our coming generations especially with our own kids our goose bumps raise up unintentionally. The harms of this menace which we keep on listening and watching on media are enough to tell how catastrophic it would further become if we don’t take action to control it immediately.

This is among few of those types of pollution which can easily migrate from one place to another. Air contaminants easily move with the wind to miles and miles because of their lighter weight and can become danger for those who actually are not responsible of their creation. Therefore, all the countries have to not only adopt measures at national level but also think globally to mitigate the contaminated air emissions to keep the air quality up to a breathable level.

How to control atmospheric pollution?

At least each country of the world has to take following actions to curb this menace from further expansion:

• Legislate to control air pollution, implement the green laws strictly and punish the air polluters without any discrimination
• During the whole process of air quality control, take on board all stakeholders especially industrialists and vehicles owners to develop in them a sense of ownership for the ambient air.
• “Air around us is our personal property” should be made a global slogan and may be publicised massively.
• Incentives must be offered in shape of easy financing and tax exemptions to those industries which keep emissions within the permissible limits.
• Above all enhance in our kids importance of air quality for our health so that when they become vehicle owners and industrialists in future government don’t have to apply laws over them as they will already be taking care of our air environment. 

About Air Pollution

Smoke-emitting vehicles plying on roads, chimneys of factories marring the air quality, heaps of garbage being openly burnt on road sides in backward countries, unrestrained burning of fossil fuels and indoor emissions owing to badly planned structure of homes has deprived us of the clean air to breath. According to a latest survey, nearly 140 million people all around the world are forced to breathe polluted air because of living in an atmosphere below the minimum level of air quality standards. We may be part of this hapless lot of the people.

What is air pollution?

Air pollution is contamination of air by the excess of various gases in the atmosphere. Air should have a moderate quantity of various gases and some of them are very essential to support the life like oxygen but the excess quantity of few of them is bad and in some cases worst for both the air quality of the environment and for the life of humans, animals and plants as well. It is generally said that many types of pollutions can be avoided for the time being or one can save oneself from their hazards but if there is pollution in the air you don’t have any other option but to inhale it for your very survival. If we don’t breathe the polluted air obviously we won’t have this much resources and a luxurious lifestyle to keep an oxygen bag on our back all the time full of clean air to inhale clean air.

What are the air pollutants?

There are three types of air pollutants.

Criteria air pollutants: These pollutants can be regulated with mitigation efforts and are the basic standard to evaluate the quality of air. Most important of them are carbon monoxide, lead, nitrogen dioxide, ozone, particles and sulfur dioxide.

Air toxics: These are the hazardous gases found in air in low concentration but are persistent enough to harm the environment and negatively impact the human, animal and plant life. Most of the air toxics are the result of motor vehicle emissions, solid fuel combustion, industrial emissions, and materials such as paints and adhesives in new buildings. Main hazardous gases under this category are: benzene, toluene, xylenes, formaldehyde and polyaromatic hydrocarbons.

Biological air pollutants: These pollutants are the outcome of the human activities. These are mostly produced by microbiological contamination like life remains of living beings including humans, animals and mainly insects which contaminate the air with emissions of smell and bacteria.

What are the sources of the air pollution?

The main sources of air pollution are:

Silencer of vehicles: One of the deadliest gases which comes out of the silencer of the vehicle is carbon mono oxide which is a slow poison if persists in the air for a long time. It is said that in a closed room if .05 per cent carbon mono oxide is present in the overall air of that room the living being staying there may die very shortly.

Another emission is hydrocarbon which is not harmful in itself but if react with sunlight may convert into myriad of harmful chemicals causing various respiratory diseases. Two other gases in vehicular emissions are oxides of nitrogen and oxides of sulphur both have potential to bring on various diseases pertaining to air, nose, eyes and throat.

If adulterated fuel is used in vehicles as is being done in most of the developing countries the situation becomes more alarming. Vehicles with adulterated fuel also emit lead which if inhaled by human folk mixes in their blood and cause various serious and lethal diseases related to heart and brain.

Chimney of industries: Industries emit various types of gases which vary from industry to industry depending upon the nature of their manufacturing process. Most dangerous of them is methane which already played havoc once in an Indian city Bhopal where an industry accidentally emitted large amount of methane owing to lack of environment and safety standards causing thousands of deaths and leaving thousands of thousands physically and mentally impaired. Its causes can still be observed there where you can find so many people with scars on skin and other physical disorders.

Coal-fired power plants are one of the biggest sources of air pollution all around the world because they emit carbon dioxide in huge quantity far beyond the permissible limits.

Carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), ozone, and fluorinated gases (hydrofluorocarbons [HFCs], perfluorocarbons [PFCs], and sulfur hexafluoride [SF6]) are major green house gases (GHG) which trap temperature in atmosphere. Their emissions by industries in excess quantity cause climate change which depletes our natural resources most importantly our precious glaciers.

What are the effects of the air pollution?

The effects of air pollution are horrendous.

• It aggravates respiratory and cardiovascular diseases.
• It severely impacts the functioning of lungs to breathe properly.
• It weakens our respiratory system with high vulnerability.
• It not only affects our nervous system but also lowers our IQ level.
• It causes cancer and premature death.

How to control the air pollution?

All of us have to play our role to control the air pollution. Pointing fingers at each other is so easy but the need of the hour is to control this menace at its source to hand over this world to our kids with an air quality not harmful for their breathing.

Role of the government: There are two pipes if regulated properly may help mitigate air pollution. One is the silencer of the vehicle and the other one is the chimney of the factory. Both can be regulated through green laws of every country and government can play an effective role to implement these laws properly. For this purpose all the governments have to admit that there is no alternate to control the air pollution if we really want to save the air quality from further degradation. 

Role of the communities: Communities have stronger role to play for this cause because whatever they would do, it would be purely voluntary and on the call of their conscience. Vehicle owners should maintain their vehicles properly and keep its silencer without any flaw to emit less. Similarly industrialists should adopt a proper environment, health and safety plan in their industries to keep their emissions within permissible limits. 

Ozone pollution

When ozone – a form of oxygen – hugely concentrates at ground level it creates ozone pollution.  Human beings and plants are quite vulnerable to ozone while this type of pollution is one of the biggest pollution problems in the world. It aggravates in sunny days which otherwise termed nice days in colder countries.  

Ozone contains oxygen threefold and is a highly poisonous gas. However, in Earth’s atmosphere it is quite beneficial as it filters the ultraviolet rays before they reach to Earth through sun. Increasing level of air pollution which contains highly toxic gases has cracked the ozone layer and now in most parts of the world ultraviolent rays are directly reaching the Earth exposing life to its harmful effects.

History of Ozone

Ozone was first time declared a new substance in 1840 and derived from a Greek verb ozein which means to smell because of its chemical odor. Its presence can be felt easily if it concentrates by 10 parts per billion in the air. The color of ozone gas is pale blue.

Brick Kiln Pollution and unlucky poor people

For the people of advanced nations, the concept of brick kiln pollution might be uncommon. They may think that how come a brick kiln causes pollution because it is so state-of-the-art factory of bricks production. 

You are right if you are lucky enough hailing from an advanced country. But in less developed and backward countries it is killer pollution which not only harms the health of the workers of a kiln but all those living in its surroundings.

Brick kilns versus other industries

Experts said that manual-based brick kilns create more pollution than a factory of other types of production. It is because in the process of production of the kilns the major activity is burning of the coal and other rough stuff like tyres, tubes and plastic material. They emit a huge amount of smoke.

Smog pollution; we can better control it together to save our kids

Smoke and fog create together smog pollution. So we call it smog which means smoke+fog. Right?

It rises in the winter season when fog also rises. In areas near to industrial zones, we see its higher level. Also in cities with a large number of vehicles, it is quite common in winter.

It occurs when vehicles and factories don't comply with environmental standards.

Burning of coal as fuel in factories and homes is also one of the main causes. Soot particles from coal-burning stay longer in fog. So it becomes smog pollution.

It hits the visibility. In the morning visibility becomes zero. So every movement becomes so dangerous. Every type of transport gets interrupted in smog pollution.

Car pollution hits both; passersby and those in the car

Car pollution means all types of gaseous emissions of vehicles.

We can’t blame only cars for this type of emissions. Buses, trucks, taxis, rickshaws, motorcycles, wagons, etc all contribute to it.

The emissions of planes, helicopters, jets, ships, and motorboats also pollute the air. But their amount is not as much as that of road transport. so we focus them less while debating this issue.

Car emissions beyond limits

It does not mean every vehicle adds contamination in the air. Only such vehicles pollute the air which emits harmful gases more than their limits. Green regulators set their limits to emit smoke. Their excess impacts both air and humans.

Factory pollution; you can't control it with green laws only

Factory pollution is also called as industrial pollution. It comprises of emissions, effluents, and wastes of any manufacturing process.

There are three main types of factory pollution. If a factory;

• Emits smoke more than prescribed limits we call it industrial emissions. It pollutes the air environment.
• Releases its effluent without treatment we call it industrial effluent. It pollutes the water bodies.
• It generates waste but does not dispose of it safely. We call it industrial waste. It pollutes the land environment.

It is not the industrialization which causes this type of pollution. It is actually the greed for manufacturing more by spending less which causes it.

Factory owners actually don't want to spend much to save the environment. They just want to manufacture more and more. To earn more and their greed never ends. So the environment suffers from their greed.

How to better control air pollution together?

You must learn how to control air pollution. If you don't, then the air around you keeps on getting polluted.

A day may come when you may be using an oxygen cylinder to enjoy the fresh air. It will add to your already high cost.

So it is a must to know the ways and means of air pollution control. You need not be an environmentalist for this purpose.

The major sources of air pollution are vehicles and industries. So to control of air pollution we must regulate the following two pipes:

• Silencer of vehicle and
• Chimney of industry.

If they emit gases withing limits, the air will remain clean. So, who will keep their emissions within the limit? It is the job of your government to do this. But without your support, the government can do nothing.

Air Pollution; the whole process of injuring air and then killing us

When several gases exceed their limit in the air, we say it is air pollution.

In air pollution, the quality of the air declines. We inhale the polluted air. So we suffer from various respiratory diseases. Most important of them are lung diseases including lung cancer.

Moderate air pollution is invisible

Unlike water and land pollution, we can't see air pollution at a moderate level. But it does harm air and our health both. When you feel suffocation while breathing, you actually become a victim of polluted air.

Industrial and vehicular emissions are two key sources of air contamination. Besides, the burning of fossil fuel also pollutes the air. It hits our breathing zone.

Silencer of vehicles, the biggest source of air pollution

The chimney of industries and silencer of vehicles are adding air pollution enormously. We can't count the emissions. Nor is there any gadget to measure them.