Scientist Urges Homes to Have Air Filtration Devices, Purchased or DIY
Air quality in the United States has vastly improved in the last five decades, but smoke from annual wildfires continues to cloud that record, says a professor who studies chemicals and other air pollutants.
“For most of the United States, for all of the pollutants that we’ve been regulating under the Clean Air Act since 1970, concentrations are going down, down, down in most parts of the United States,” says Dr. Tracey Holloway, professor of energy analysis and policy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in an interview with SciLine. “But the trends in wildfire smoke are setting us back, and many places are having levels of air pollution in the air that weren’t seen since 1970 or earlier, or even never. And so … the trends in wildfire and their impact on air quality really are a big deal.”
In the recent SciLine interview, Dr. Holloway shared some basics on keeping ahead of unhealthy or hazardous air quality threats by monitoring, staying indoors, and taking advantage of a home air purifier.
She recommends using a phone app for monitoring the current air quality index (AQI), or going to airnow.gov, which is produced by the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Air quality levels are ranked by color and range from green (good) to purple and maroon (hazardous). In between are yellow, orange, and red. Yellow means moderate or “not quite as good as it could be, but it’s not triggering any health-based standards,” Dr. Holloway explains. Orange means it registers above the limits that the EPA has set for “sensitive groups,” while red “is unhealthy for everyone.”
Dr. Holloway said the “the science behind the health impacts [of air pollution] is really well established.” (See The Earth & I, August 2021). “Your life expectancy gets shorter, heart disease goes up, respiratory disease goes up, birth outcomes can be worse.”
“Lung disease,” Dr. Holloway adds, “would be the most prominent negative outcome associated with many air pollutants, but especially wildfire smoke.”
“Once [the AQI] gets into the red,” she cautions, “everyone can take steps to protect themselves.” The first step is to stay indoors, especially where there is an air filtration system. It does not have to be an expensive air filtration system, she adds. “It actually can be something you make yourself.”
Dr. Holloway recommends an inexpensive, easy-to-construct home air purifier called a Corsi Rosenthal box. Just about anyone can make one; the materials are inexpensive, and they work better than those purchased from a store, says its inventor, Dr. Richard Corsi, dean of UC Davis's College of Engineering (see DIY video here with written instructions and illustrations in the chart below).
For those who must be outside when there is a nearby hazardous air quality event, Dr. Holloway recommends using “the same kind of masks that we all have following the pandemic” because they are good for filtering the particulate matter found in wildfire smoke and other air pollutants.
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