Cleaning Pakistan's air Sanchez-Triana, Ernesto; Enriquez, Santiago; Afzal, Javaid ...
2014., 2014, 6-26-2014, 2014-06-26, 2014-07-30
eBook, Book
Open access
Pakistan's urban air pollution is among the most severe in the world and it engenders significant damages to human health and the economy. Air pollution, inadequate water supply, sanitation, and ...hygiene are the top environmental priority problems in Pakistan. Industrialization and urbanization, in conjunction with motorization, can result in further deterioration of urban air quality. This book examines policy options to strengthen the Pakistan clean air program (PCAP) to better address the cost imposed by outdoor air pollution upon Pakistan's economy and populace. The approach provided in this book recommends that the federal and provincial environmental protection agencies (EPAs) take on a limited number of high return, essential, and feasible interventions drawn largely from the PCAP. The objective of this book is to examine policy options to control outdoor air pollution in Pakistan. The findings of the analysis aim at assisting the Government of Pakistan (GoP) in the design and implementation of reforms to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of Pakistan's ambient air quality institutions. The overarching theme of this book is that prioritizing interventions is essential to address the cost of outdoor air pollution, given current resource limitations. The book also includes a review of secondary sources, focusing on recent analysis of the effects of different air pollutants on human health, as well as lessons learned from ongoing regional and international efforts to improve ambient air quality. This book has seven chapters. Chapter one gives overview. Chapter two identifies major trends in ambient air pollution, including concentration levels of main pollutants and the identification of principal sources. Chapter three examines the evolution of Pakistan's air quality management (AQM) framework over the period 1993 to 2013. Chapter four examines options to control air pollution from mobile sources, the main contributors of several air pollutants, including noxious fine particulate matter (PM) and its precursors. Chapter five addresses measures to tackle pollution from industrial sources. Chapter six identifies synergies of interventions for air pollution control and climate change mitigation. Chapter seven summarizes the main conclusions of the book.
In 1880, coal was the primary energy source for everything from home heating to industry. Regions where coal was readily available, such as the Ruhr Valley in Germany and western Pennsylvania in the ...United States, witnessed exponential growth-yet also suffered the greatest damage from coal pollution.These conditions prompted civic activism in the form of "anti-smoke" campaigns to attack the unsightly physical manifestations of coal burning. This early period witnessed significant cooperation between industrialists, government, and citizens to combat the smoke problem. It was not until the 1960s, when attention shifted from dust and grime to hazardous invisible gases, that cooperation dissipated, and protests took an antagonistic turn.The Age of Smokepresents an original, comparative history of environmental policy and protest in the United States and Germany. Dividing this history into distinct eras (1880 to World War I, interwar, post-World War II to 1970), Frank Uekoetter compares and contrasts the influence of political, class, and social structures, scientific communities, engineers, industrial lobbies, and environmental groups in each nation. He concludes with a discussion of the environmental revolution, arguing that there were indeed two environmental revolutions in both countries: one societal, where changing values gave urgency to air pollution control, the other institutional, where changes in policies tried to catch up with shifting sentiments.Focusing on a critical period in environmental history,The Age of Smokeprovides a valuable study of policy development in two modern industrial nations, and the rise of civic activism to combat air pollution. As Uekoetter's work reveals, the cooperative approaches developed in an earlier era offer valuable lessons and perhaps the best hope for future progress.
The growing populations around the world are closely associated with rising levels of air pollution. The impact is not restricted to outdoor areas. Moreover, the health of building occupants is also ...deteriorating due to poor indoor air quality. As per the World Health Organization, indoor air pollution is a leading cause of 1.6 million premature deaths annually. Therefore, numerous companies have started the development of low-cost sensors to monitor indoor air pollution with the Internet of Things–based applications. However, due to the close association of air pollution levels to the mortality and morbidity rates, communities face several limitations while selecting sensors to address this public health challenge. The main contribution of this systematic review is to present a qualitative and quantitative evaluation of low-cost sensors while providing deep insights into the selection criteria for adequate monitoring. The authors in this paper discussed studies published after the year 2015, and it includes an analysis of papers published in the English language only. Moreover, this study highlights crucial research questions, states answers, and provides recommendations for future research studies. The outcomes of this paper will be useful for students, researchers, and industry members concerning the upcoming research and manufacturing activities. The results show that 28 studies (70%) include indoor thermal comfort assessment, 26 (65%) and 12 (30%) studies include CO
2
and CO sensors, respectively. In total, 32 (45.7%) out of 71 sensors (whose prices are available) discussed in this study are available in a price below the US $20 over online marketplaces. Furthermore, the authors conclude that 77.5% of the analyzed literature does not include calibration details, and the accuracy specification is missing for 39.4% sensors.
This article aims to discuss the impact of air quality on human health, measures to achieve the goal of good indoor air quality and proposed benefits of interventions of Unani Medicine with an ...evidence-based approach.
The significance of air quality on the health of the community cannot be denied. Recent evidences from WHO illustrated data on severe air pollutants and their impacts on human health ranges from minor upper respiratory irritation to chronic respiratory ailments including lung carcinoma and heart disease associated with premature mortality and reduced life expectancy. In Unani Medicine, air has been included in the list of factors, which are six in number and play the central role in prevention of diseases and maintenance of health. Air is considered as the medium of most of the extrinsic factors such as chemical and biological pollutants affecting health and their exposure results in short and long-term health issues. The literature of Unani Medicine proposes many simple and effective measures, which help to improve indoor and outdoor air quality. The goal of outdoor clean air is achieved through implementation of measures to tackle the source of pollution, while indoor clean air is attained through various means e.g., fumigation with herbal drugs. Hence, an extensive literature survey on Unani reserve was conducted to collect information about the concept of air discussed under the heading of six essential factors and its implication in prevention of diseases and maintenance of health. Further, research databases such as Pub Med, Google Scholar, and Science-Direct were broadly searched for evidence on the efficacy of herbals mentioned in Unani literature for the indoor air purification and subsequent air quality improvement.
Recent studies showed good air quality leads to decrease in mortality, particularly of respiratory and cardiovascular deaths whereas poor air quality results in a variety of diseases. Unani scholars prescribed several regimens such as
(Fumigation),
(Nasal instillation) and use of
(Perfumes) and
(Incense) for the improvement of air quality. Likewise various herbal fumigants and sprays containing drugs like mī'a sā'ila (
Mill.), mastagi (
L.), mushk (
L.), loban (
W. G. Craib), ābnoos (
J. Koenig ex Retz), zā'fran (
L.) and sirka (vinegar) etc. has been well explained and used exclusively for air purification and improvement of AQI. Therefore, in the present scenario of altered air quality, we forward certain measures described in Unani system of medicine for health promotion and protection. Scientific evidence on several drugs reveal the presence of a number of pharmacologically active substances, which may provide a new approach into the purification of air.
Particulate pollution has important consequences for human health, and is an issue of global concern. Outdoor air pollution has become a cause for alarm in India in particular because recent data ...suggest that ambient pollution levels in Indian cities are some of the highest in the world. We study the number of particles between 0.5μm and 2.5μm indoors while using affordable air purifiers in the highly polluted city of Delhi. Though substantial reductions in indoor number concentrations are observed during air purifier use, indoor air quality while using an air purifier is frequently worse than in cities with moderate pollution, and often worse than levels observed even in polluted cities. When outdoor pollution levels are higher, on average, indoor pollution levels while using an air purifier are also higher. Moreover, the ratio of indoor air quality during air purifier use to two comparison measures of air quality without an air purifier are also positively correlated with outdoor pollution levels, suggesting that as ambient air quality worsens there are diminishing returns to improvements in indoor air quality during air purifier use. The findings of this study indicate that although the most affordable air purifiers currently available are associated with significant improvements in the indoor environment, they are not a replacement for public action in regions like Delhi. Although private solutions may serve as a stopgap, reducing ambient air pollution must be a public health and policy priority in any region where air pollution is as high as Delhi's during the winter.
Chemical compositions of atmospheric fine particles like PM2.5 prove harmful to human health, particularly to cardiopulmonary functions. Multifaceted health effects of PM2.5 have raised broader, ...stronger concerns in recent years, calling for comprehensive environmental health-risk assessments to offer new insights into air-pollution control. However, there have been few studies adopting local air-quality-monitoring datasets or local coefficients related to PM2.5 health-risk assessment. This study aims to assess health effects caused by PM2.5 concentrations and metal toxicity using epidemiological and toxicological methods based on long-term (2007–2017) hourly monitoring datasets of PM2.5 concentrations in four cities of Taiwan. The results indicated that (1) PM2.5 concentrations and hazardous substances varied substantially from region to region, (2) PM2.5 concentrations significantly decreased after 2013, which benefited mainly from two actions against air pollution, i.e., implementing air-pollution-control strategies and raising air-quality standards for certain emission sources, and (3) under the condition of low PM2.5 concentrations, high health risks occurred in eastern Taiwan on account of toxic substances adsorbed on PM2.5 surface. It appears that under the condition of low PM2.5 concentrations, the results of epidemiological and toxicological health-risk assessments may not agree with each other. This raises a warning that air-pollution control needs to consider toxic substances adsorbed in PM2.5 and region-oriented control strategies are desirable. We hope that our findings and the proposed transferable methodology can call on domestic and foreign authorities to review current air-pollution-control policies with an outlook on the toxicity of PM2.5.
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