Smog Living in a Clogged World and. The Results that Are Experienced. High Point University EDU 3232

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1 Smog Living in a Clogged World 1 Smog Living in a Clogged World and The Results that Are Experienced High Point University EDU 3232

2 Smog Living in a Clogged World 2 Abstract This paper will explore the effects of smog on the environment and the health of all those living in it. It will show the changes of smog over the centuries and the continuing growth of smog and how it has led to a globalization and universal goal to decrease/eliminate smog and also the ongoing efforts to make smog a more well-known problem that needs to be addressed. Smog does not only have an affect on people when they are outside, but also can play a role on our lives when we are inside our houses as well as inside schools. A lot of people are unaware of why smog is created and what causes it, so this paper looks at the chemistry behind smog and its presence in everything we do. We will also look at different statistics of the amount of people that are affected from smog each year and address the ways to prevent further instances of smog.

3 Smog Living in a Clogged World 3 Smog Living in a Clog World and The Results that are Experienced Smog is the name given to the chemical soup produced from photochemical reactions in the atmosphere, as said by Abelsohn, Stieb, Sanborn, and Weir (2002). In the article Solving the Riddle of Smog by Levy, Wilson, and Miller the word smog was invented to describe a mixture of smoke and fog. Photochemical smog is mostly induced from traffic but also from industrial activities, power generation, and solvents and this smog has become one of the main concerns for air quality today (Molina, M., and Molina, L., 2004, p. 644). The effects of smog are often invisible and indirect (Levy, et al. 1970, p. 17). The air quality keeps deteriorating in the world, and smog is becoming more and more present and will remain in the air until we figure out a way to prevent/decrease these chemicals from being produced. Air pollution used to only be considered at local levels but more recently it has been seen as a global concern. Smog has many effects on the environment and the people that live in it. With the growing effect of smog on the environment it is important for everyone to become environmentally educated, some schools, colleges, and universities are beginning to embrace elements of environmental education with increasing numbers, emphasizing environmentalism as a core principle of their education (Venkataraman, 2008, p. 9). Today we are living in a clog world that is created by smog; to understand smog we must first understand what creates smog, the history of smog, the things in our lives that smog effects, and how to educate the public about the dangers, and how we can decrease/prevent smog from occurring and prevent it from damaging our world any further.

4 Smog Living in a Clogged World 4 Every year, the U.S alone pollutes the skies with over 200 million tons of waste products (Westerman). To understand the effects of smog on the population we must understand the make up of this air that we breathe in everyday. The smog that you will later reader about that affected London, is not that type of smog that is around today. The smog that is present today is the smog that is irritating eyes, shriveling plant life, and hazing skies, which is known as photochemical smog (Levy, et. al, 1970, p. 17). A. J Haagen-Smit figured out the real nature of photochemical smog, which is the creation of smog in today s world, and he showed the world that atmospheric hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides, mainly from auto exhausts, were reacting under the influence of sunlight to create the smog that is present today (Levy, et. al, 1970). The old saying if I can t see it, it s not there is not the way to approach understanding smog; photochemical smog damaging effects are often invisible and indirect, and its important for us to understand what creates this substance that effects us everyday that we are not always aware of (Levy, et. al, 1970, p.17). The basic components of photochemical smog are hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides and neither of which are particularly harmful to us until sunlight is added to the equation and results of ozone, aerosol formers, aldehydes, organic peroxides, nitrates, etc. occur (Levy, et. al, 1970). Below is the chemical smog equation in its simplest terms as show by Levy, Wilson, and Miller: sunlight RH + NOx = smog The above equation shows that when a mixture of hydrocarbons (and organic compounds in general) and nitrogen oxides is exposed to sunlight, smog occurs (Levy,

5 Smog Living in a Clogged World 5 et. al, 1970). Now that we know the equation for smog, we must understand the three basic groups of components, which are oxidants, aldehydes, and aerosol formers (and there are also other smaller components as well). The first group, oxidants, which are the most important group are defined as anything other then oxygen that is in the air and helps transfer oxygen atoms (Levy, et. al, 1970). The most well know oxidant would be ozone, and smog damage to plants and materials and some of the eye irritation is because of oxidants (Levy, et. al, 1970). The ozone molecule can damage the lung tissue once breathed in and the particular matter also can irritate lung tissue and this is because these particles are so tiny, they can work deep into the lungs (Mickley, 2007). The next component of smog is the aldehydes, which are responsible for most of the eye irritation we experience. Aldehydes are created by formaldehyde and aerolein, which are foul smelling stuff (Levy, et.al, 1970). The last component is the aerosol formers, which create the typical smog haze and are composed mostly of hydrocarbons with high molecular weights (Levy, et. al, 1970). The aerosol formers also reduce visibility in the air and can be hazardous to our health. The effects of smog have changed over time and throughout history. Air pollution was originally only considered at the local level to be a problem and the air pollution of cities took on an individual character (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 430). In the middle ages in London mountains of coal piled up as a result of sea trade from vessels laden with animal hides, whale oil, tallow, dried fish and meats, fertilizer and wools that caused foggy weather (Davis, 2002). By the fifteenth century, London skies were regularly blackened with coal smoke and this is when Londoners decided to char coal instead of wood, since it lasted longer and was hotter (Davis, 2002). One early local system that was

6 Smog Living in a Clogged World 6 developed to decrease smog in the air was in medieval London when special laws [were] developed that referred to the emissions from specific trades, limeburners, blacksmiths and armourers (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 430). Air pollution and the effects of smog began to grab national attention when local legislature in Britain was created call the Alkali Acts of 1863, which created a national agency called the Alkali Inspectorate, to control pollution (Brimblecombe, 2005, p ). The ongoing occurrences of acid rain [and]/or forest fire smoke serve to remind us of the need to address air pollution problems in an international context and the importance of realizing the severity of air pollution in the world (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 429). Scientists have begun to study the effects of smog in the environment and have called the new smog of the twentieth century photochemical pollution, and scientists have recognized that such chemistry that caused this pollution was universal and that this smog did not only just describe one area of the world (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 432). One of the great smogs that has ever occurred happened during the twentieth century, and this was The Great London Smog. The Great London Smog changed the way the world looks at pollution, as was quoted by John Nielsen of NPR in the article written by David Laskin (2006). In earlier years, pollution was always thought of as a part of life, and then the incident of The Great London Smog occurred and all of that changed. On December 6, 1952 the visibility in London was less than 10 meters and the air had become so thick that residents of these areas were getting lost in their own neighborhoods (Laskin, 2006). During this era of life, around World War II, London was the world s largest cities providing home to a population of more the eight million people and mostly all of these residents used burning coal to keep them warm during the winter (Laskin, 2006). Every

7 Smog Living in a Clogged World 7 day in London, chimneys gave out 1,000 tons of smoke particles, 2,000 tons of carbon dioxide, and 370 tons of sulfur dioxide into the already current foggy air (Laskin, 2006). David Bates, a physician that worked at Saint Bartholomew s Hospital in central London, got to experience the amount of deaths that occurred during this time and this event became know as modern London s most massive civilian disaster (Laskin, 2006). In this tragic week alone, 4,703 people died compared to 1,852 people who died the pervious year during the same week (Davis, 2002). London lost, within a week span around 3,000 deaths more then usual and these numbers did not even address the people that would die from the long-term effects from the smog remaining in the air over the coming months. During the time of The Great London Smog, officials stated that many of the deaths that occurred were as a result of the flu and neglected to accept that the reason so many people were dying was because of the smog in the air and the difficultly of breathing. Even though officials were not ready to accept that smog is a growing problem and has an effect on the life expectancy of people, British parliament made the Clean Air Act of The UK Clean Air Act of 1956 was made to decrease/prevent the issues of smog in the world. This act was put in place to handle domestic and factory smoke and created smokeless zones within cities, which meant that people could not use coal in their homes; this brought up the issue of personal freedoms at the time that scared politicians (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 432). With the installation of The Clean Air Act, problems of air pollution caused by burning coal have gradually gone. The twenty-first century air pollutants brought about a wider range of concern, and there is much debate on whether the air pollutants are better or worse now, but either way there is no doubt that it has

8 Smog Living in a Clogged World 8 changed dramatically (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 432). In earlier years, the issue of pollution that is created indoors has been neglected while in reality, according to a survey taken in California, people spend 87% of their time inside, 7% in enclosed transit, and 6% outdoors (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 435). The air pollution is highest indoors when it is cold conditions outside and this is because the heating that needs to be done within the house is at its highest. It is a problem to address the concern of the issue of indoor pollutants and this is because it provokes the issue of personal freedom and makes administration of rules and regulations more difficult to deal with (Brimblecombe, 2005, p. 435). It is important that people of the twenty-first century get rid of the perception that the home is an essentially safe place and unpolluted, when we must realize that it is indeed polluted as well. In contemporary society the choice of interiors, domestic fuels and consumer products also increasingly influence the state of the air we breathe and with these changes in society pollution has become globally more homogeneous (Brimblecombe, 2005, p.435). In the article, Megacities and Atmospheric Pollution, written by Mario Molina and Luisa Molina they discuss the rapid growth of megacities which are defined as metropolitan areas with populations exceeding 10 million inhabitants (p. 644). With the ongoing expansion to these areas stress is getting put on the natural environment and affecting the places we live. In 2000, 48% of the world s population lived in what we call urban areas, and now the number of those living in urban areas is expected to increase by 2% for the next three decades (M. Molina, et. al, 2004). With the growing of these urban areas, problems will occur in the Earth s atmosphere, especially when the world population will go from 6.1 billion in 2000 to 8.1 billion in 2030 (M. Molina, et. al,

9 Smog Living in a Clogged World ). Megacities have a major influence on smog in the Earth s atmosphere because transportation is a major source of air pollution and a challenge that is facing megacities is how to give up transportation and the effects it causes on the atmosphere without giving up the benefits of mobility (M. Molina, et. al, 2004, p. 646). Smog is created when sunlight aggravates certain chemicals, and cities create these heat islands that also help trigger the creation of smog. One shocking statistic is that a child born today in an industrialized country will add more consumption and pollution over his or her lifetime than children born in developing countries (M. Molina, et. al, 2004, p. 646). Smog affects many things in our lives not just environment issues, some of these things are that it impairs visibility, contributes to preventable illnesses and deaths, and a recent study that it may be lowering IQ scores. Visibility in places like Hong Kong s Central District is often surround in haze and prevents people from seeing the skyscrapers (Economist, 2007). In a study done in China in 2006, the Civic Exchange found that local emissions were the main causes of pollution on 192 days and mainland emissions on 132, and only 41 days were fairly low on pollution (Economist, 2007). In Ontario, Canada without particular matter (PM) suspended in the air the visual range is between 86 and 120 km, however this decreases significantly to between 35 and 50 km when there is the presence of particular matter (M. Molina, et. al, 2004). Visibility, however is not the only thing that smog effects in our lives, it also affects our health. Young children, the elderly and people with existing chronic cardiac and respiratory disease are the group of people that are most affected health wise by smog, but others that are not in this category can be affected as well (Abelsohn, et. al, 2002). In 2000 in Canada, there was an

10 Smog Living in a Clogged World 10 estimated 1900 premature deaths, 9800 hospital admissions, 13,000 emergency room visits, and 46 million illnesses caused by air pollution (M. Molina, et. al, 2002). This shows us the importance of lowering the amount of smog that is let out into the atmosphere daily. Now a recent study in 2007 that is being conducted from the Harvard School of Public Health found that there is indeed a link between IQ scores and smog. This study found that children who live and attend schools in high traffic pollutants scored an average of 3.7 points lower than children living in less polluted areas (Evans, 2010, p.15). This study is bringing around alarming results and showing that maybe even living near high traveled areas can affect the growth of your baby. Mothers that have been exposed to these high traffic areas gave birth to infants whose blood contained a DNA sequence associated with asthma (Evans, 2010, p. 15). Smog is having a major affect on all of our lives whether we realize it or not and we must try to find ways to manage our intake of smog and the amount that is in the atmosphere. Smog has also been a problem within the schools. Indoor air quality (IAQ) inside the schools have sometimes been said to be worse then outside the schools (Torres, 2000). A lot of students are affected by indoor air quality because during their kindergarten, elementary, and secondary education years, children will spend a minimum of 23% of their time inside of a school building and this is unfair to the students and their health because they are placed in certain schools based on where they live (Torres, 2000, p. 1). Out of all the schools, public schools are more vulnerable to IAQ and some characteristics that are seen are occupant density, pollutant sources, poor construction, building renovations, use of portable buildings, tight budgets, and difficult political climates (Torres, 2000, p. 1). The poor environments that are created due to bad air

11 Smog Living in a Clogged World 11 quality create a bad learning environment for teachers and students and can cause serious side effects. The side effects that can happen include long-term and short-term health problems for the teachers and students, impact the learning environment and attendance, reduce productivity based on sicknesses that are created, increase the potential for schools to be closed down, straining relationships with parents and those that work at the school, create negative publicity, and finally create potential liability issues (Torres, 2000). When detecting in the school has poor IAQ officials must check all of the following according to Torres (2000), the symptoms are widespread across the school, the symptoms disappear when the students leave the school building, the symptoms begin after a change occurs in the school building, when a person has asthma has the symptoms inside the school and not outdoors. Pollution in the air is causing major effects to all those that come in contact with it in some way and we must find the ways to decrease/eliminate the effects, and we can do this by educating the public. Educating the public is an important aspect of changing the amount of smog that is consuming our world on a daily basis. According to an article written in 2008, the last 15 years have seen an explosion in environmental education programs (Venkataraman, 2008, p. 9). With the increasing emphasis on the importance of environmentalism as a core principle people are beginning to realize the effects of smog and want to be educated more, and this is occurring in other nations also. The GlobeScan did a survey in 2000 and in 2006 and they saw a 10% increase in the amount of people in the United States that said climate change is a serious problem (Venkataraman, 2008, p. 9). This is a good sign for progress in the future dealing with smog and helping our clogged world. A mnemonic device that was invented to help determine the effect of smog on individuals

12 Smog Living in a Clogged World 12 in CH2OPD2 which means community, home, hobbies, occupation, personal habits, diet, and drugs (Abelsohn, et. al, 2002). Doctors use this mnemonic device to detect what is causing the breathing problems with their patients. Also the Air Quality Index was developed and this was developed to inform the public about the air quality on a given day and it focuses on measuring these 6 common air pollutants: carbon monoxide, ground-level ozone, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, suspended particulate matter, and total reduced sulfur compounds (Abelsohn, et. al, 2002). This index is put on a scale of 0 to 100 (or more) and the scales are known as very good air quality, which is when the numbers are 0-15 in the index and very poor air quality when the numbers are 100 or more (Abelsohn, et. al, 2002). Smog checks were also used in California with testing the exhaust emissions from automobiles, but they were not the best way to determine the effects of smog. In the article, Breathing Room, written by Klein and Saraceni they said that the smog checks were not helping because they were only performed once every two years on idling cars and they may not represent what movie automobiles actually emit the other 729 days of the biennium (Klein, et. al, 1994). The way to decrease/eliminate smog is to first realize what are the reactive hydrocarbon emissions in the air and understand their effect on the photochemistry in the air. Smog chambers are inventions that have been created to study more about smog, and they are precisely controlled, closely monitored atmosphere-in-miniature (Levy, et. al, 1970, p. 19). They can come in all different sizes, but one of the smog chambers that is operated around the world is at Battelle-Columbus, it is 8 feet high, 16 feet long, and 5 feet wide, built from functionally inert aluminum and Teflon (Levy, et. al, 1970, p. 19). One of the sides on this specific smog chamber has 7 eye ports on it to check for eye

13 Smog Living in a Clogged World 13 irritation and this is done because the opposite side of the chamber has fluorescent lamps to cause the eyes to irritate if mixed with smog (Levy, et. al, 1970, p.19). The smog chamber was invented to help do research on photochemical smog and figure out how to control this substance; the smog chambers have done research on gasoline and smog, as well as organics from stationary sources and their effects on smog. The results that were found from the gasoline and smog study are still in process but have yielded results that show that some aromatics, despite reports to the contrary, are efficient aerosol formers and are causing smog to occur and this type of results help those that make gasoline produce low-pollution gasoline for cars (Levy, et. al, 1970). Most people believe that smog is only created from gasoline from cars when in reality, as shown from the smog chambers, it can come from organics from stationary sources that are within the home. These stationary sources consist of paints, lacquers, cleaning fluids, solvents, and organic process chemicals of various sort and places that have realized the effect of these substances have and have limited these substances that play a role in formation of photochemical smog (Levy, et. al, 1970). The overall information that we have received from smog chambers is those components that help in smog formation and we can examine these components more closely and can help to eliminate the problems. Another way to prevent smog and air pollution is to encourage people to reduce using their cars all the time and work on carpooling and using public transportation as well. Walking and biking are also a good way to decrease the amount of smog in the environment. Since smog is also indoors as well it is important for people to choose different household cleaners and paints to not get reactant chemicals and dispose waste appropriately (Abelsohn, 2002).

14 Smog Living in a Clogged World 14 The word smog was originally created to describe a mixture of smoke and fog and has turned into a much bigger problem in the world we live in today (Levy, et. al, 1970). Smog has changed throughout history and has gone through many changes, these changes include the things that create smog and the amount of people that understand the effects smog has on the environment and it s people. It is important for everyone to know the history of smog and to know the damages it has done in the past and the things in our lives that it effects and knowing that even when you are indoors you are still being effected by smog. Smog has become a global concern and in places like Hong Kong, Anthony Hedley (University of Hong Kong) calculated that bad air causes around 1,600 deaths per year (Economist, 2007). Today we are still living in a clogged world and we must try our best to decrease the amount of reactive chemicals we have going into our air each day because even though smog may look and smell different today the potential for disaster remains (Laskin, 2006).

15 Smog Living in a Clogged World 15 References Abelsohn, A., David, S., Sanborn, M. D., & Weir, E. (2002). Identifying and managing adverse environmental health effects: 2. Outdoor air pollution. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 166 (9). Retrieved from EBSCOhost Brimblecombe, P. (2005). The globalization of local air pollution. Taylor & Francis, 2 (3), Doi: / Davis, D. (2002). The great smog. History Today, Frontline. Evans, H. (2010). The pollution IQ equation. E Magazine Economist (2007). Smog gets in your eyes. Economist Newspaper. 383 (8535) Retrieved from EBSCOhost. Klein, D., Sacaceni, C. (1994). Breathing room. Reason Foundation. 26 (2). Retrieved from EBSCOhost. Laskin, D. (2006). The great London smog. Weatherwise. 59 (6). Retrieved from EBSCOhost. Levy, A., Wilson, W. E., Miller, S. E. (1970). Solving the riddle of smog. Battelle Research Outlook. 2 (3) Mickley, L. J. (2007). A future short of breath? Possible effects of climate change on smog. Environment, 49 (6), Molina, M. J., & Molina, L. T. (2004). Megacities and atmospheric pollution. Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association, 54,

16 Smog Living in a Clogged World 16 Torres, V. M. (2000). Indoor air quality in schools. Center for Energy and Environmental Resources at the University of Texas Venkataraman, B. (2008). Why environmental education? Environmental Magazine, 50 (5), 8-10.