First Name | William |
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Last Name | Nazaroff |
Email Address | nazaroff@ce.berkeley.edu |
Affiliation | UC Berkeley, Civil & Environmental Eng |
Subject | Ozone emissions into indoor environments |
Comment | I strongly support the efforts of the CARB to regulate emissions of ozone from indoor air cleaning devices. At one level, it defies logic that we should invest such remarkable effort as a society to control ozone in urban air (an effort that is well justified, given the health effects evidence) and at the same time allow sale of devices that generate substantial levels of this same pollutant in indoor environments. Less well understood, but likely of comparable importance is that ozone reacts with indoor materials to produce harmful byproducts. Among these are formaldehyde and ultrafine particles. Product yields are such that the reaction tradeoff is generally bad news for human health. Consider, for example, formaldehyde. Health-based guidelines are about 50-100 ppb for ozone. For formaldehyde, we are concerned with concentrations that are at least an order of magnitude lower, i.e. 2-10 ppb. Ozone reactions on indoor surfaces might typically produce 3 ppb of volatile byproducts, such as formaldehyde, for every 10 ppb of ozone consumed. An indoor concentration of 50 ppb of ozone typically means that 100 ppb worth of ozone would also have reacted on indoor surfaces, producing about 30 ppb of volatile byproducts, including several ppb of formaldehyde. The best way to control the problem of exposure to ozone byproducts -- and growing evidence suggests that it is a real problem -- is to limit or avoid introducing ozone into occupied spaces. I have been involved in a related study recently, investigating ozone in aircraft cabins and the health of passengers and crew. In one investigation, we exposed passengers (healthy young adult women) to varying air quality conditions in a simulated cabin during 4-h periods. Ozone levels of 60-75 ppb were strongly correlated with adverse symptoms typical of "sick-building syndrome." A research article focusing on the symptoms is attached; it is "in press" in the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology (P Strom-Tejsen et al.). Another article that focuses on the reactive chemistry of ozone in the cabin environment has just been published in Environmental Science & Technology (CJ Weschler et al., Ozone-initiated chemistry in an occupied simulated aircraft cabin, ES&T 41, 6177, 2007.) Simply put, the existing health evidence about the adverse effects of ozone and the emerging evidence about the adverse effects of ozone byproducts combine to provide compelling arguments that ozone should not be emitted in substantial quantities into indoor air. I know of no scientifically defensible countervailing argument. |
Attachment | www.arb.ca.gov/lists/iacd07/8-strøm-tejsen_etal_2007.pdf |
Original File Name | Strøm-Tejsen etal 2007.pdf |
Date and Time Comment Was Submitted | 2007-09-23 09:18:53 |
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