The cognitive costs of air pollution

https://patrickcollison.com/pollution

by jseliger • 7 years ago

1020 285 7 years ago

patrickcollison.com

brenden2• 7 years ago

This is blogspam. Here's the original post: https://patrickcollison.com/pollution

wizzwizz4• 7 years ago

Should I upvote despite that, or wait for somebody to post the original? I'm not sure of HN's norms here.

floatingatoll• 7 years ago

You can upvote and also email the mods using the Contact link in the footer; they can swap out links easily.

dang4• 7 years ago

Better not to post the original if there's already an active thread, because that will either have no effect or split the discussion. We usually change URLs in cases like this. Best is to email hn@ycombinator.com because then we're sure to see it.

CelestialTeapot• 7 years ago

That would be a much better link than the one provided. Wasting energy on the "IQ" issue is not productive to the problem presented: that air pollution does, indeed, cause (hopefully only temporary) cognitive decline. It can be measured on a small scale, for example, see the Allen et al. [1] article showing cognitive decline in an office environment (conventional building vs Green+ building).

1. https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/27662232/4892924...

dang4• 7 years ago

Changed from https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/11/ai.... Thanks!

larnmar3• 7 years ago

If the effect were present, and as large as implied, you’d expect low IQ test results in ultra-polluted Chinese cities such as Shanghai and Beijing. And yet... http://www.city-data.com/forum/world/2348902-china-iq-map-pr...

ErikAugust• 7 years ago

Pardon my ignorance, but how is this IQ data obtained? It is reported by the government? Are IQ tests standardized?

learc833• 7 years ago

IQ tests standardized?

IQ tests can't be standardized across cultures. Even something like Raven's Progressive Matrices has a cultural component. https://www.apa.org/monitor/feb03/intelligence

Also China has some issues with the way they report scholastic achievement that make their results appear higher than they should. China is very selective about which students take standardized tests that are used for global comparisons--they aren't random samples.

TrainedMonkey2• 7 years ago

It's official data released by Chinese. Which helps explain why Han Chinese are on top of the list.

INGELRII2• 7 years ago

The whole point of IQ is that it tests common factor (as in factor analysis) underlying different tests. There is known correlation between different testing methods.

BurningFrog• 7 years ago

How long have they been that polluted though?

Looks like that map is from 2005.

glofish6• 7 years ago

No that is not what it is claimed. Pollution reduces your IQ, not that it makes your IQ lower than someone else's.

The people living in those cities form a so-called "self-selecting" sample. They are probably, on average better educated, and they recognize the value of education much better. They already would score higher than the others, that's why they moved to the city.

It might just as well be that the same people would score far higher in a non-polluted city.

gnode3• 7 years ago

The original post doesn't mention IQ. IQ is a terrible metric for studying short-term cognitive effects.

TrainedMonkey2• 7 years ago

Large cities tend to concentrate IQ as smart young adults come to seek better fortune. Furthermore Chinese party selection system, which involves standardized tests and relocation of gifted children to better schools in big cities also contributes heavily.

Scene_Cast2• 7 years ago

How do you all monitor air quality?

I personally have a couple of devices (an Awair and a Flow). They seem to under-report PM2.5 compared to purpleair, airnow, and waqi.

spladug• 7 years ago

The South Coast (California) Air Quality Management District does some really thorough tests on the quality of the various low-cost sensors: https://www.aqmd.gov/aq-spec/evaluations/summary-pm

PowerfulWizard2• 7 years ago

Anyone want to review this table and suggest a currently commercially available option in the $300 and lower price range? I may have time this afternoon but if anyone does go thorough it I'm interested to know.

briefcomment• 7 years ago

Measurements from PurpleAir's network of public sensors are available for free.

It's a useful tool if the locals in the area that you're interested in are using PurpleAir's sensors.

https://www.purpleair.com/map?opt=1/mAQI/a10/cC0#1/25/-30

fizwhiz• 7 years ago

Dylos AQM is the gold standard. It's pricey though and has an old school interface (no fancy UI, IoT or "AI").

ng122• 7 years ago

I have an Awair. I don't really trust the baseline values but I do trust the deltas. I mostly use it to inform me when I should open a window or turn the air purifier or humidifier on.

doitLP• 7 years ago

I have a uHoo and it’s been great. The readings are inline with some control sensors I got to test the readings.

tasty_freeze• 7 years ago

I have a uHoo monitor (yes, it is a dumb name).

https://uhooair.com/

It logs temperature, relative humidity, air pressure, CO2, CO, TVOC, PM2.5, NO2, and ozone. They are about $300. The device itself doesn't have any UI; you need to connect to it via a phone app.

gonehome2• 7 years ago

I have an Awair and two Foobots, they're basically completely unreliable and the software for them is pretty bad.

I've been tempted to get the purple sensors because at least the purple map seems reliable (so maybe their stuff is better?).

leonroy• 7 years ago

Any idea how good the Awair monitors are? I recall a report saying they were just so-so but Awair recently updated them to be more accurate.

I personally use an IQAir Air Visual which is highly rated and meant to be very accurate as far as consumer grade stuff goes. It's solid, reliable and the iOS app has been great.

That said after installing piHole I noticed it making 17000 DNS requests a day to a non-existent host: https://imgur.com/tPgwGoK

Explains why the DNS Resolver on my router (pfSense) kept crashing at least.

yissp• 7 years ago

Do you act on this information? Is there really much you can do to mitigate the effects?

CharlesColeman2• 7 years ago

Do you act on this information? Is there really much you can do to mitigate the effects?

Couldn't you run a HEPA filter to reduce the particulates?

https://phys.org/news/2018-09-indoor-hepa-filters-significan...

sujNansnam• 7 years ago

If you have central air, you can put a good filter in your air return. If you don’t, you can buy a standalone air purifier.

suzakus• 7 years ago

Personally I have a PurpleAir II filter (as mentioned in a different part of this thread.) I also turn wood in an indoor environment, and run a HEPA filter which reduces the PM2.5 in the air drastically, and quickly.

Psychlist8• 7 years ago

For me just running an evaporative cooler roughly halves the counts, but that's from over 100 to about 50 so it's a kinda of a mixed blessing. But since my rented house isn't airtight or even close to it, there's not a lot I can do other than move.

skocznymroczny• 7 years ago

I have Xiaomi Mijia Air Detector and Xiaomi Mi Purifier 2S. The air detector reports CO2, PM2.5 and TVOC, Purifier reports only PM2.5.

vrodic• 7 years ago

I have pms3003 you can get for about 12 USD on AliExpress.

I bought a small usb-to-serial adapter connected to Raspberry Pi Zero W.

Here's a combo with a similar device here:

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32617788139.html?spm=2114.12...

There are plenty of comparisons available online, but there's a good overview site here: https://aqicn.org/sensor/

yagurastation5• 7 years ago

The inexpensive SDS011 holds up very well and works for this global citizen science project very well: https://luftdaten.info/evaluation/

cdiamand• 7 years ago

I have an arduino uno hooked up to CCS811 (a tiny air sensor chip). We're floating around 550ppm C02 right now, but earlier I was terrified as I watched the levels spike to 4500.

Youden5• 7 years ago

I've built my own "IoT" Sensors by hooking up a bunch of components to an ESP32 on a breadboard. I ended up going with:

- CO2: Sensirion SCD30

- Particulates: Amphenol SM-UART-04L

- VOC: Sensirion SGP30

- Temperature/humidity/pressure: Bosch BME680

After hooking everything up I just wrote some code to pipe sensor readings to InfluxDB, which is connected to Grafana.

In the end I have no way of properly testing accuracy but the sensors are consistent between units and behave as expected when exposed to fresh air, which is the most I can look at right now.

known• 7 years ago

Poverty also reduces IQ by 13 points https://archive.is/bmj11

larnmar3• 7 years ago

Has this study been replicated? It seems a lot like one of those terrible “priming” studies that won’t.

Statistics aside, the experimental methodology is terrible. You ask a bunch of people to think about being poor, or not, and that’s supposed to be a simulation of being poor or not?

9dl4• 7 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experimen...

The replication suggested that economic background, rather than willpower, explained the other half

Yeah

And 250k/y "poor"

https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/09/the-sel...

https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/09/in-defe...

mberning• 7 years ago

I'm confused - is IQ a reliable way to measure intelligence between individuals, or is it a culturally biased measure that is scientifically bankrupt? I guess it depends on the context.

glofish6• 7 years ago

whatever skills IQ tests measure these do correlate (and better than other readily measurable predictors) with various long term successes

what throws most people off is that the skill that IQ test measure is not a just an innate ability but a learned skill that is in demand and often needed for success in that society

rahuldottech• 7 years ago

This really bothers me. I live in a VERY polluted place, and unfortunately moving away won't be an option for me for at least half a decade. What can I do to minimise the health effects of such an atmosphere? I'm planning on getting an indoor air filter for my home.

4ec0755f5522• 7 years ago

Find one that can filter nano particles.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20191113-the-toxic-killer...

carapace• 7 years ago

That's brutal! We're poisoning ourselves.

cameldrv5• 7 years ago

Essentially all air filters filter nano particles.

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/can-hepa-filters-capture...

graeme• 7 years ago

Starts with monitoring. Awair or laseregg are good quality monitors. Then you can assess how well filters work.

I think there are masks you can use outside too. You can also check which times of day/days are worst. And which streets. You can carry the laseregg around for local measures.

bearforcenine3• 7 years ago

PurpleAir also makes an indoor air quality sensor that measures particulate matter: https://www2.purpleair.com/products/purpleair-pa-i-indoor

Not sure how it compares with Awair or laseregg.

I have no affiliation with PurpleAir, but they are pretty popular in Utah.

9dl4• 7 years ago

Just google brands and find that they may be not so accurate or may be calibrated for some specific region of China

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/how-accurate-are-common-...

So may be better solution are local laboratories with calibrated equipment

Masks are tricky.

Most "light" masks are for huge particles and can't defend against most of dangerous chemicals

Military and science masks are working good against some chemicals and do not protect from another. Except solutions with O2 tanks on your back

puranjay• 7 years ago

I'm assuming Delhi?

Not much you can do except get out. I've already started moving out for the first 2-3 weeks of November and working from a city like Panjim

dmos624• 7 years ago

I'm not sure what _VERY_ polluted means, but you might consider taking up more physical activity. On GCN youtube cycling channel they argued (including interviews with some health professionals) that even if you live in a city with considerable pollution, the positive effects of commuting on a bicycle outweigh the negative effects of air pollution. They were primarily talking about Britain-scale pollution of course. The principle might change if transfered to a more extreme environment. Something to look into.

koopuluri• 7 years ago

My hunch is OP lives in an Indian metro. I absolutely do not recommend commuting on a bike or exposing self to outdoor air in any way during a commute in an Indian metro.

danenania• 7 years ago

Any physical exertion that makes you breathe harder will cause you to take in more pollution, worsening the effects. Even if exercise helps to offset the damage, your best bet in a polluted place would be to do it inside.

Richard_East2• 7 years ago

Its not difficult, firstly buy a monitor which tracks CO2, PM2.5, VOC:

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32887570197.html?spm=a2g0s.9...

Tracking CO2 is very useful for internal spaces.

And an Air purifier: https://www.amazon.com/Purifier-Display-Formaldehyde-Sterili...

OJFord2• 7 years ago

Why is the first step to monitor it, not 'get a HEPA filter & fan / purifier'?

Monitoring seems like it's interesting to do if you want to, but if you already know it's an issue, just start addressing it?

cameldrv5• 7 years ago

Buy a cheap PM detector (There are a few on Amazon using the Plantower sensor that are ~$50.) Buy any HEPA air filter for your home. Buy the best cabin air filter you can for your car (Bosch makes HEPA filters for some cars), and try to get your office to install something, or just buy one for your desk.

The hard math of it is that no matter what you do, you aren't going to be able to reduce your exposure by more than 75% or so, because you have to go outside sometimes, so going super high end on filtration makes essentially no difference in terms of total exposure.

CharlesColeman2• 7 years ago

The hard math of it is that no matter what you do, you aren't going to be able to reduce your exposure by more than 75% or so, because you have to go outside sometimes, so going super high end on filtration makes essentially no difference in terms of total exposure.

Couldn't you get a mask for outdoor use?

https://www.guidingtech.com/62349/whats-difference-n95-n99-p...

Psychlist8• 7 years ago

I think it's more like 99% on particularly bad days, because where I live over 100 ug/m3 is common during the fire season (which is apparently now November to April)

But if you live in places where the particulates are normally low then yeah, cutting from 50 to 5 is hard.

Baeocystin• 7 years ago

As an aside, I recently bought a car that has a cabin air filter, a first for me. I am genuinely surprised at how much of a difference it makes, especially on air quality alert days. (I live in the Bay Area, which isn't too bad, but we've had plenty of Spare the Air alerts this year.)

simonebrunozzi4• 7 years ago

Is the Plantower sensor a very precise one? I'd like to buy an air monitor, but of course there's no way (at least for me) to know which ones are precise and which aren't.

seanmcdirmid3• 7 years ago

Do you live in Beijing?

We got an expensive swedish air purifier but it still sucked hard (noisy, made the air smell very stale). You might be able to mitigate some of the effects, but not all of them. And if young kids are involved (or you are expecting), screw the career, move.

blakes• 7 years ago

Did you get an IQAir? I bought the GCmultiGas and I get the kind of stale air, I think it is just hyper sanitized or something. That filter cleared up my sinus issues in like two days.

lensopra• 7 years ago

https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2011/07/why-not-a-d...

mattjaynes• 7 years ago

David Heinemeier Hansson (DHH of Rails fame) gave a great talk on this recently, though he focused more on indoor air quality and its cognitive impact:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRqh8oLY7Ik

hinkley• 7 years ago

My takeaway from this: If you live in new construction (owner, or renter), buy new furniture in the spring/fall when you can leave the windows open. Same for paint.

calibas• 7 years ago

I highly suspect toluene has something to do with it, seeing as how it's a potent neurotoxin and a byproduct of burning fossil fuels.

pkaye• 7 years ago

I thought IQ was not a reliable measure of anything?

ytNumbers• 7 years ago

I wouldn't call IQ a completely useless yardstick. Likely through examining all of the evidence regarding IQ and military performance, the United States government has come to the conclusion that an IQ below a certain level disqualifies the person for military service.

Unsurprisingly, US law is a bit complicated on this, but to summarize, it implies that an IQ below 81 (“tenth percentile”) is disqualifying, and dictates that persons with IQ's between 81 and 93 (“thirty-first percentile”) cannot comprise more than 20% of all enlistees.

mrandish• 7 years ago

It depends on how one defines intelligence and what specific things are considered material to the measurement. IQ tests measure the things that IQ tests measure. The challenge is that the things we often want to determine in trying to assess "intelligence" are multi-dimensional, multi-variate and have complex interactions.

Personally, I consider most typical assessments of a person's general "smartness" to approach zero utility.

pmart1232• 7 years ago

Reading his bullet points, I am not sure why the correlation between daily stock market returns and air quality supports the argument that air pollution reduces IQ.

PeterisP• 7 years ago

One hypothesis is that part of the short-term stock movements is causing about publicly visible stupid acts, causing either physical or PR disasters of various sizes. That would imply some correlation, but a relatively small one.

pmart1232• 7 years ago

Many if not most trading decisions are not executed from a NYC office. The exchange servers aren’t in NYC either, but like that matters.

bryanmgreen2• 7 years ago

I wish the argument against pollution would be the simplest one.

Go to a massively unpopulated area and just breath. Feel the difference? Isn't it intoxicating?

Who gives a crap if umpires make worse calls? Just fight pollution because it's obvious pollution is bad for humans and the planet.

Normally I'm all for extra evidence, but in a situation like this come on. It's basically like immaterial evidence against genocide by saying, I don't know, saying the increased production of bullets to commit genocide reduces national science and health budgets by 12% (fake stat just for context). Who cares! It's just plain bad.

/rant

(ps - rant isn't against the article, but a broader frustration about the topic)

dmos624• 7 years ago

I like thinking of it as waste, as opposed to bad. Good-bad is the moral realm. Waste is the realm of practicality. The danger is in causing defensiveness, due to judgment, in people whose open-mindedness would be beneficial. I'm not being apologetic of anyone. It's just that this doesn't have to happen through a dramatic conflict of good v. evil (which probably wouldn't work anyway); there are much better alternatives.

I agree with everything you said. Just wanted to stack my rant on yours there.

licebmi__at__• 7 years ago

I would like to agree with you as I also think trying to find a pragmatic solution is easier than thinking in abstract terms like good/bad, but ultimately waste just takes us to questions about what is being wasted, and wasteful to who. It's a no brainer than relocating to somewhere to avoid emissions can be seen as wasteful for some industries. Besides, framing waste in purely monetary terms, just means that we need to balance the equation for profit, not to what is best for people. The question of alignment between profit and human welfare is still am ethical one.

You haven't reduced the complexity, just hidden it behind the facade of taking "pragmatic economic decisions".

11235813213455• 7 years ago

it's just that the amount of waste is way too large for the environment to digest

Solution: everyone must consume less, cut unnecessary things, and there are many in most people lifestyles

swiley• 7 years ago

We need to quantify how bad pollution is exactly. How many people should be allowed to die because the ICE ambulance can’t reach them or the doctor isn’t able to travel to the hospital or food isn’t able to be delivered for a reasonable price etc.

bryanmgreen2• 7 years ago

Want some numbers from our government about pollution?

New coal legislation was pushed through with an intensive study by the EPA....

They said it would kill up to 14,000 people.

1) https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2018-08/documents...

2) https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/21/climate/epa-coal-pollutio...

larnmar3• 7 years ago

I wish the argument against pollution would be the simplest one

Arguments against pollution would be valuable if someone were actually arguing in favour of pollution.

zaptheimpaler• 7 years ago

Agreed. In a data-driven world, any claim not backed by data will be quickly dismissed :)

konstmonst• 7 years ago

George Carlin - "The Planet is fine, the people are fucked ..."

Kaiyou• 7 years ago

You are right that there's a massive difference between populated and unpopulated areas. One is better because it doesn't have as many people. Just by breathing people create Co2. Just by existing people create waste. Not sure how that could be fixed.

rbavocadotree3• 7 years ago

From the original source:

Stock market returns are lower on polluted days.

I don't want to dismiss the entire article, but I think this points to possibility that there is some bad statistics going on here. I don't see how daily stock returns are proof of, or even related to, cognitive ability on a daily basis.

This is exactly the type of finding you'd expect with p-hacking.

lazyjones• 7 years ago

This is probably just a coincidence. Stock markets perform lower on Mondays: https://www.macroption.com/stock-market-performance-volatili...

Traffic is probably generally higher on Mondays, though I have only anecdotal evidence.

ajross3• 7 years ago

Heh, a rare example of the "proof of correlation isn't proof of the absence of causation" fallacy. No reason that stock markets couldn't perform worse on Mondays because of the extra traffic pollution.

cowsandmilk2• 7 years ago

The journal article explicitly calls out day of week and controls for it...

ajross3• 7 years ago

It's a review article. The paper you mention was just one of many cited. And sure, those are all different papers written by different authors and it's surely not unlikely that there are errors in there. But the reason for reviews like this one is to point out that all these different results support the same basic hypothesis.

As far as stocks, specificaly: really? People with cognitive trouble make bad stock picks all the time. Most of us have grandparents who have exhibited exactly this kind of mistake. While it's surely true that the bulk of analyst-driven trades are checked by methods that aren't sensitive to pollution (or just by analysts in different climates), there are certainly enough single-decider trades going on to show a small effect like this if it exists.

I mean, no, one oddball stock market paper doesn't prove much of anything. But in combination with a bunch of other research like this, it's worth taking seriously.

cowsandmilk2• 7 years ago

Read the linked journal article; the authors don’t actually claim it is about cognitive ability, they attribute it to lower risk taking on those days.

rbavocadotree3• 7 years ago

As someone who works for a quantitative hedge fund, you wouldn't believe how many similar results I see of researchers showing a statistically significant predictor of stock market returns. Almost every single one of them is garbage.

But your point stands. The paper has nothing to do with cognitive ability. So why is it being used as evidence?

andy_ppp• 7 years ago

Maybe people are more negative because of traffic, noise and frustrated about getting to work later. I find it hard to imagine a way to control for this short of making people breathe these substances separately and seeing if they actually do have lower IQs. You can then control for the other factors. These all seem to be epidemiological studies that we can't show the pollution is for sure the root cause. It could, for example, be that pollution is 25% of the result for example with more noise, traffic, irritation etc. being the other 75%.

alexandercrohde• 7 years ago

"I don't want to dismiss the entire article"

Good. Because you can't cherry-pick one dubious-seeming journal article and use it as a justification to ignore several completely unaffiliated articles.

sgustard• 7 years ago

To clarify, the paper studied "air quality in the vicinity of Wall Street".

PeterStuer• 7 years ago

So does this mean we can now expect populist politicians to crank up PM2.5 emitters at a massive scale prior to elections?

WhompingWindows• 7 years ago

You mean diesel engines? They're trying that in France.

SuperFerret• 7 years ago

Rural America says Hi!

dredmorbius• 7 years ago

Rolling coal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_coal

hombre_fatal2• 7 years ago

No need. Some people gleefully accept and partake in air pollution.

Out in the countryside where my parents live in Texas, people are even proud that they burn their trash as if they're sticking it to some sort of treehugger group rather than to the inner lining of their (and all their neighbors' and loved ones') lungs.

olivermarks2• 7 years ago

So logically living and working in the countryside is optimum for your IQ rather than polluted cities and areas?

electricslpnsld• 7 years ago

The countryside can have some bad environmental problems too (expansion of fracking in the rural Midwest of America, etc).

javagram• 7 years ago

Does fracking cause much air pollution of the type discussed in the article? I thought the main issue was groundwater and earth quakes , and methane gas release / flaring.

Plus there are many countryside areas with no oil.

Psychlist8• 7 years ago

The bushfires act as a counterbalance in Australia ...

crispinb• 7 years ago

Too true. I live near a significant recent bush fire & had my first run for a couple of weeks this morning - clear breathable air is a joy! These periods are pretty uncommon however - compared to the regular temp inversions & associated low air quality in Brisbane, for example.

Admittedly with the current climate collapse gaining pace at breakneck speed, it's possible that this may be the 'new normal' for the Australian bush very soon.

dang4• 7 years ago

Url changed from https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/11/ai..., which points to this.

ng122• 7 years ago

Things like this make it really hard to follow a discussion as it evolves over time.

dang4• 7 years ago

Yes, there's some churn, though we do what we can to minimize it, e.g. posting the URL change in the thread. But the benefit of switching to original or better sources is greater than the cost of the churn. Discussions gradually become higher-quality. Also, not switching to original sources also creates noise in the threads, e.g. complaints about blogspam.

acd• 7 years ago

Most small particles are bad for health.

Small particle emissions can be anything, diesel cars emissions, stone dust and flour from bakeries. All small particles are bad for the lungs. Long term exposure of air pollution will lead to health problems.

geomark• 7 years ago

Although all small particles are bad for the lungs, there must be a difference in their effects on brain and organs, depending on what those small particles are made of since PM 2.5 particles pass through lung lining and into the blood to be distributed around the body.

igor47• 7 years ago

Plug: if you care about this topic and are interested in working on this problem, we're hiring at Aclima. We've got contracts with the major air quality regulators in California, and are looking to scale. Ping me at igor@aclima.io

maelito• 7 years ago

Do you work with https://plumelabs.com ?

thedudeabides5• 7 years ago

Anyone seen analysis or similar data for noise pollution?

yagurastation5• 7 years ago

This open source air quality citizen *science project now also has noise sensors going: https://luftdaten.info/laermsensor-bauen/

QuanticSausage• 7 years ago

I don't know you, but in every lecture in college that was done in a room with no air flow, I got distracted every five minutes or so. If the proportion of C02 had a cognitive effect that I could feel, then I wouldn't be surprised if other kinds of contaminants do the same.

ketzo• 7 years ago

Can’t find a source, but there’s a similar thing with long meetings — after two hours in a conference room, you’ve added enough CO2 to affect cognitive function.

lekanwang• 7 years ago

I think you may be referring to this publication: https://energyanalysis.lbl.gov/publications/co2-indoor-pollu...

mc34• 7 years ago

Sydney is having a bad day :-( https://aqicn.org/city/sydney/

seanmcdirmid3• 7 years ago

We would call 159 a clean air day in Beijing.

Forest and bush fires suck. Even Seattle air can smell bad when the wind blows in smoke from a big forest fire up in BC.

mc34• 7 years ago

Sydney radio loves comparing it to Beijing. Then reminding us that we've just got that for a day.

digitalsushi• 7 years ago

short of plants, i want to find a device i can put in my area that reduces the co2 in the air. (my space doesn't support plants, it's too cold).

dheelus• 7 years ago

There's a decent amount of research that indicates that indoor air quality doesn't significantly improve with indoor plants. https://time.com/5105027/indoor-plants-air-quality/

cwkoss• 7 years ago

Most CO2 scrubbing systems either use plants (sometimes algae) or expend chemical ingredients (not very practical for long term daily use). Id recommend looking at systems designed for survivalist bunkers.

I did find this interesting project for using a thermosiphon to separate CO2 from air which looks pretty cool, but would likely require a good bit of sun to work well. I imagine it could work with an electric heating element instead of the sun, however.

https://www.instructables.com/id/Solar-powered-CO2-Scrubber/

driverdan• 7 years ago

You want heat recovery ventilation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_recovery_ventilation

yagurastation5• 7 years ago

Anyone interested should also check out the open source citizen science project https://luftdaten.info/en/

Build your own inexpensive sensor, contribute to the global network. See also https://github.com/opendata-stuttgart

simonebrunozzi4• 7 years ago

For people living in the US like me, this is where you find US pollution maps: https://usa.maps.luftdaten.info/

umvi• 7 years ago

Holy cow, that must be a German project; Germany has nearly 100% coverage, the USA has almost none.

I was expecting China and India to be dark purple

Psychlist8• 7 years ago

It frustrates me that there are so many of these networks and they don't talk to each other. I deliberately went with a system that measures multiple values, but then I see other people going "we only measure one thing instead of nine so our units cost half as much".

I should try to script at least my systems so they write into as many of the open networks as I can manage.

https://www.uradmonitor.com/

yagurastation5• 7 years ago

Unfortunately, yes, the space is fragmented. A long while ago I chose https://luftdaten.info/en/ because sensor firmware, DB, and tools are truly open source (GPL, ODbL, MIT). Next to supporting many sensors, it also allows for your own back-ends (API, InfluxDB). The community is awesome and has hacker values.

The inexpensive part makes citizen science viable in sub-economic and hobbyist settings.

https://openaq.org/ is trying to consolidate air quality data, but I'm uncertain of their licensing and goals.

H8crilA• 7 years ago

Sorry for a pointless post, but this project gives me the CCC vibes. Y'all should attend one day, it's brilliant! In fact it's so rich in things and hacker exhibitions that you don't even have to go to the talks!

admiral33• 7 years ago

What is CCC? Searching brings up many things.

gerbler2• 7 years ago

I'd love to set up something like this in my garden. Could I figure this out without speaking German?

yagurastation5• 7 years ago

Certainly. When using the flashing tool referenced here: https://luftdaten.info/en/construction-manual/

...you simply select the English firmware `latest_en.bin`. Or one of the languages you prefer.

gridlockd• 7 years ago

All of these publications are junk science, nothing but spurious correlations, using the nonsensical linear no-threshold model.

(waiting for the internet to correct me so I don't have to do any research myself)

JesseAldridge• 7 years ago

Here's a map of PM2.5 levels in San Francisco for those interested: https://hoodline.com/2015/04/should-you-be-worried-about-air...

WalterBright5• 7 years ago

"Exposure to CO2 and VOCs at levels found in conventional office buildings was associated with lower cognitive scores than those associated with levels of these compounds found in a Green building." – Allen et al 2016. The effect seems to kick in at around 1,000 ppm of CO2.

The last time this came up I bought a CO2 meter for my office. I was quite surprised how often it went over 1,000. Outside air runs around 450.

I increased the duty cycle of the house fan, and open a window when it reaches 800. Right now I'm at 505.

Buying the meter was a really good investment.

popotamonga• 7 years ago

Where please? What model.

en-us• 7 years ago

I'm not the OP, but I use this one with similar results: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B01FYWU2IS

One of these days I'm going to have to rig up something to start the house fan when the CO2 goes above 800 ppm and I think you'd need a different sensor with a realtime output port for something like that.

WalterBright5• 7 years ago

CO2Meter AZ-0004

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001PDGFR8/

sxates• 7 years ago

I did the same thing at my office and brought it into a conference room with 7 other people. We watched the CO2 climb to about 900 and then it started going down. Seems the climate control system is also tracking CO2 and it started pushing fresh air in when the level got too high. A nice surprise that we have systems managing this - I don't know how common that is in offices though.

romwell• 7 years ago

Could be a correlation with heat: seven people in a tiny room can generate enough heat so that the thermostat kicks in.

gonehome2• 7 years ago

I think this is a common (maybe required?) thing in HVAC systems where they detect CO2 and turn on when it climbs too high.

zebraflask• 7 years ago

Anecdotal, but I used to work in an IT department where some areas had good, or at least tolerable, ventilation and some very clearly did not. The difference in moods and productivity between teams in each was distinct enough to notice, but, at the time, I don't think anyone would have thought of CO2 levels as a confounding issue.

Psychlist8• 7 years ago

I have a slightly more capable one but the results are similarly motivating. Right now I'm more concerned with the particulate counts... if 27 is bad, does 120 worse and going outside into 700+ me dumberer?

inside: https://www.uradmonitor.com/tools/dashboard-04/?open=8200009...

outside: https://www.uradmonitor.com/tools/dashboard-04/?open=8200011...

In the office at work is better: https://www.uradmonitor.com/tools/dashboard-04/?open=8200011...

When I was living in Lakemba this prompted me to rig a HEPA filter outside and run my bedroom at positive pressure. That helped a lot. But I've had to move for work so now I'm renting a cardboard box (ok, technically it's "fibro" on piles with a leaky wooden floor. Outside ~= inside)

davidwihl• 7 years ago

What device did you use to capture all the data including radiation?

kardos• 7 years ago

From your indoor page, CO2 min is 375 ppm. How did you get that below the atmospheric value of ~410 ppm?

amelius3• 7 years ago

Curious, did you notice the cognitive effect yourself?

WalterBright5• 7 years ago

No. But I do notice I think better when jogging - whether that is due to fresh air outside or increased blood flow, who knows. Probably both.

amelius3• 7 years ago

Perhaps when we commit code, we should have a script that adds "this code was written at x ppm CO2" to the commit message :)

WalterBright5• 7 years ago

I learned long ago to not even try to write code when I'm above a certain threshold of tiredness. I just have to tear it all out again after a night's sleep.

blaser-waffle• 7 years ago

"Written at BAC .04 / couple of pints, no smokes"

pastor_elm• 7 years ago

I see low CO2 spaces becoming the next big thing for the privileged classes as CO2 levels rise. Weworks of the future will be advertising this as a definite selling point. Mansions with scrubbers getting it down to 200ppm

WalterBright5• 7 years ago

Opening a window works fine.

I recall reading once that the health of poorer people was better one or two hundred years ago because poorer people ate cheap food - i.e. vegetables - rather than a meat-heavy diet.

alexis_fr• 7 years ago

Seriously, I’ve always thought people in Sydney compared to France were taller and healthier because they have more oxygen... Not only they are outdoors often, but they also have less stuffy buildings. Classrooms in France are the epitome of “stuffy”, and it’s frequent for me to leave a theater because there is 400 people and the vents are off. The usual reaction is to imply I’m sensitive ;)

moultano• 7 years ago

I put one in my son's bedroom and was blown away. He's 3, and calls me in to sleep with him sometimes. It's a small room, and we keep the doors closed so his sister doesn't wake him up and I was blown away by how high the CO2 got with both of us in there: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/cek4dm/co%...

9HZZRfNlpR• 7 years ago

What did you use to measure? Unfortunately all the ones I've seen linked here are too expensive for someone like me who doesn't live in America. I wonder if there are cheap ones out there that maybe not so precise but at least measure something.

jobigoud• 7 years ago

Reminded me of the videos by Kurtis Baute: "I sealed myself in a Jar".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoKvPkwP4mM

jonstewart2• 7 years ago

One of the big trends in green/sustainable building is creating relatively air tight buildings in order to cut down on heating and cooling costs (see: Passiv Haus, Passive House, Pretty Good House). In order to do that, though, mechanical ventilation is needed. As a result, Heat-Recovery Ventilation & Enthalpy-Recovery Ventilation residential units can be installed for only $2k-$4K. Seems like a worthwhile investment (for when it’s not convenient or possible to open a window).

ip262• 7 years ago

The other upside to sealing plus mechanical ventilation (instead of leaky-building ventilation) is that your building is always fresh. Leak-driven ventilation leads to a building that is drafty on windy days and stuffy on calm days.

Gibbon12• 7 years ago

Trouble with passive houses is a) people open windows. b) hate fan noise. c) the designs are brittle and prone to catastrophic failure. d) energy consumption isn't going to an issue over the life of the building. e) In Europe and North America the replacement rate for housing is in the low single digits.

eugenijusr• 7 years ago

I live in a relatively new apartment building that has heat recovery system installed in all apartments by default. My apartment is 73sqm, the ventilation unit is rated at 300m3/h. The building is located in a busy part of town with lots of traffic around. The city has a humid continental climate (Dfb) so it does get pretty cold during winter.

It does help a lot and I couldn't imagine living without it.

- Filters out particle pollution - https://twitter.com/eugenijusr/status/1105740301493260289

- Removes CO2 - averages ~650ppm in all rooms, almost never goes higher than 1000ppm (3 person household).

- Retains up to 85% of heat (based on the specs) using the exchanger, but also has an active electric heater inside that can be turned on in winter for ultimate comfort.

- Removes moisture from the bathroom and kitchen and dumps it into the drain via a separate drain pipe.

- Isolates from the outside noise as you can keep your windows closed shut all the time.

It does have some drawbacks however:

- Up to +6dB noise in rooms when running at full power (I run it at 20% at night which only adds ~+1dB).

- F7 class filters need to be changed every 3-6 months (~50€).

- Air intake grill with a pre-filter mesh needs thorough cleaning every 6-12 months as it usually gets clogged with debris in spring and autumn.

Not sure if it's due to these drawbacks or lack of knowledge lots of residents don't actually use their unit. You can tell by the open windows all year round. Most say it's too noisy for them - most probably due to lack of maintenance. Others are just plain ignorant saying opening windows is the only way to get "fresh air".

cylinder• 7 years ago

Been meaning to do this; do you have a link or recommended model?[EDIT: I see you already responded with the model below - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001PDGFR8/ ]

I'm very sensitive to lack of oxygen in a room. Our office is old and some days they don't run the A/C if it's not hot enough outside, and I feel like I'm suffocating and my productivity suffers.

gwern• 7 years ago

Previous discussions on HN debating the Allen result among others: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14738010 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21237875 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18959796 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19845029 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14738010 http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/lw/nk0/what_is_up_with_car...

ralphstodomingo• 7 years ago

Thanks for these links Gwern, down the rabbit hole I go. But how would you summarize the situation? Is it that there's not a definite study that proves the whole thing?

UnbugMe• 7 years ago

Those links, one per line:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14738010

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21237875

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18959796

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19845029

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14738010

http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/lw/nk0/what_is_up_with_car...

JohnBooty• 7 years ago

In the comments on that lesswrong post from a few years back, you raised a good question that is perhaps easily answered:

    it has the same issue as Kurzban's blood-glucose/willpower
    criticism: if the brain needs more oxygen than it's getting
    why doesn't one simply breath a little more? While sedentary
    during these sorts of tasks, you have far more breathing
    capacity than you should need

Seems quite likely (or at least very possible) that we've outpaced evolution here, right?

Prior to the industrial revolution, seems our bodies would never have needed to adapt to a rapid spike in environmental CO2 levels. Our brains are necessarily good at signaling the body when they need more oxygen; they're not necessarily good at realizing when they're dealing with other issues they're not adapted to react to.

I believe there may be a common misunderstanding the relationship between CO2 levels and oxygen in one's body, at least as it was explained to me by doctors during my mom's struggles with COPD.

Blood oxygen saturation levels and CO2 levels are not inversely correlated. One of the problems with late-stage COPD and reduced lung function is that while it's relatively easy to get a person's oxygen levels up (just administer oxygen!) they still suffer the effects of excess CO2 in the blood. A late stage COPD sufferer can have > 95% O2 saturation in their bloodstream and still suffer the other effects (including cognitive issues) that result from the excess CO2.

(Apologies for responding you wrote four years ago)

techiferous• 7 years ago

After watching this Tom Scott video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Nh_vxpycEA I bought this CO2 monitor: https://amazon.com/gp/product/B00MB93CK8 It worked quite well and showed that I don't have anything to worry about. Now I'm trying to pass it on to someone else. I'll be willing to sell it for half price if anyone is interested.

essem• 7 years ago

sent you an email!

darkmighty• 7 years ago

If anyone is interested it seems you can find (more or less reliable) sensor modules for about $20, such as the MH-Z19, and read it from to an arduino or esp.

initself• 7 years ago

Which meter did you buy?

saberdancer• 7 years ago

Does anyone know of a cheap IoT type sensor for CO2? It can be any type, even RasberryPi or Arduino based. I'm not interested in sensors without connectivity options.

About the levels, I'm working on an IoT project and I've seen data from a public school that has heating with radiators (so no real ventilation). One classroom with the sensor would routinely rise above 1000 ppm, with peaks over 3000ppm. Then you'd observe a sudden drop in CO2 level and temperature as they would open up a window. It's insane how high it can get especially if the building lacks proper ventilation.

benjaminRRR• 7 years ago

I bought this guy for the office - works well https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00TH3OW4Q

Youden5• 7 years ago

There are a bunch of raw sensor components that you can connect to an Arduino or Pi. I ended up going with the Sensirion SCD30 but also tested options from Amphenol's Telaire line. Both are pretty easy to communicate with using an Arduino.

I haven't tested an MH-Z19 but that's a popular cheap option.

vixen99• 7 years ago

On the other hand, a paper on 'Effects of Exposure to Carbon Dioxide and Human Bioeffluents on Cognitive Performance' (2015) concludes that 'only exposures to bioeffluents when CO2 reached 3,000 ppm significantly affected performance of some cognitive tasks. Increased arousal level at this exposure can be used to explain the observed results.'.

https://backend.orbit.dtu.dk/ws/portalfiles/portal/125818556...

734129837261• 7 years ago

From Western Europe I moved to Mexico City. I work and live here now, and this city suffers intense amounts of pollution almost every day. When you take an Uber somewhere they all drive with their windows open (airco's are expensive to run) and you get the full blast of diesel trucks and older cars' fumes.

I came here for a girl. I'm leaving because of pollution. The city is amazing in its own right, but I feel like I'm breathing lung cancer.

zachkatz2• 7 years ago

Damn, I’m about to go to Mexico City—was planning to stay for a few months, but I hate dirty air. Is it like that all over the city, or just certain parts?

stevenwoo• 7 years ago

I stayed for a week for work ( lot of traffic that seemed typical after walking around, San Miguel Chapultepec, Mexico City, Federal District) in mornings when I awoke and blew my nose into paper tissue it was dark with the dirt? filtered by I guess my nose/respiratory system. This has never happened to me in Northern California or living near downtown Houston/Austin, Texas.

frandroid• 7 years ago

Mexico City sits in a former volcano, so the air pollution of one of the world's largest metropolitan areas is trapped in there.

josu• 7 years ago

It's definitely better/worse in some areas. Condesa is probably your best option.

robbiep• 7 years ago

I don’t believe the nature study results presented there. The MMSE is such a basic test that it is almost impossible to score less than full marks unless you are cognitively impaired. I’ve run through it hundreds of times with patients. The other tests are more cognitively demanding. Looking at the Table 1 of that nature study, there appears as if there would be a significant difference in the distribution of ages - couple extra older people in one of the study groups. I think this is a false positive result

ghufran_syed• 7 years ago

I think this is an important question to answer, but the shehab paper (the first link) provides vertically no useful information. They didn't blind the assessors carrying out the cognitive studies, which on its own invalidates their conclusion. They also didn't randomize the ordering, but appear to have "investigated for order effects", found "no statistically robust difference", then proceeded to have every participant do the "post exposure" test second, making it highly likely that fatigue alone could explain their effects. With only 30 subjects, their tests for ordering effects are likely underpowered.

Also note that they did 11 different tests, but didn't appear to correct for multiple comparisons [1]

This would be a really interesting problem to study, but you'd probably want to look at academic performance in college students before and after transfer between universities e.g urban vs rural (presuming you can measure differences in pollution) between the two, you'd expect to see a relative drop in academic performance going from rural to urban, now that would worry me. But this study is unhelpful.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_comparisons_problem

radium3d• 7 years ago

If the effects are permanent then your results would be inconclusive if studying the same people transferring between polluted and non polluted universities.

pliny2• 7 years ago

Just want to say it's impossible to tell which paper you're referring to.

The first link on the page isn't a paper. The word shehab doesn't appear anywhere on the page. The word shehab doesn't appear anywhere in the first paper linked. The three quoted sentences / fragments you provide don't appear anywhere in the first paper linked. I opened some of the papers and didn't see any with n=30.

vonmoltke• 7 years ago

Patrick quietly dropped the entire first paragraph in the examples list a few hours ago: https://web.archive.org/web/diff/20191118190006/201911190530...

jdkee• 7 years ago

It has real physical health consequences as well.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog_of_London?wprov=s...

beilabs• 7 years ago

This is fantastic stuff. Some personal anecdotes, moving from Ireland to a heavily industrialized city in Northern China definitely felt like a kick to the head to my output.

I've felt similar effects since moving from Sydney to Kathmandu. Looking forward to my eventual move back to Ireland in the coming years not only for my own health but for that of my children. Unfortunately Kathmandu is going down the path of major Indian cities; there are improvements but the lack of oversight on construction / dust as well as older vehicles with poor fuel makes for a lethal combination causing a dust bowl effect.

sn41• 7 years ago

I live in Northern India. On occasions when I visit cleaner countries like NZ, Singapore etc. my productivity goes up. I thought this was because my colleagues were absent. Maybe PM 2.5 is also to blame!!

ngeoozz• 7 years ago

I just read the contamination levels of the River where I live next by (8º worst polluted place in the world). Always <25.0 µg PM 2.5 and 55 µg PM 2.5 in a lot of cases. This is highly depressing tbh.

simonebrunozzi4• 7 years ago

I am looking for a very precise sensor to install at home. Any has experiences with these (no affiliation whatsoever)? https://www2.purpleair.com/collections/air-quality-sensors

w1nst0nsm1th• 7 years ago

The study didn't show any example of possible influence regarding violent behaviors. I read some times ago widespread violence in america in the second half of the 20th century, especially in the 80', were related to lead poisonning due to car exhaustion and water contamination through public lead plumbery.

amaurymartiny• 7 years ago

There's a study[1] by Richard Muller from Berkeley Earth that proposes an equivalence between air pollution and daily cigarettes smoked. He uses the number of deaths caused by these 2 factors as a common denominator to calculate the equivalence.

I believe cognitive cost would also be a good denominator. Something like "we find that an increase of 10 µg/m³ raises the probability of a chess player making an error by 1.5 percentage points. The same 1.5 percentage points would be caused by smoking 2 cigarettes per day."

Plug: I'm the author of an open-source mobile app[2] which does this pollution-cigarettes conversion. I think cigarettes gives a strong image of air quality for those who are unfamiliar with AQI.

[1] http://berkeleyearth.org/air-pollution-and-cigarette-equival... [2]: https://shootismoke.github.io/

philshem• 7 years ago

Recent Radiolab podcast talks about the one and maybe only benefit of IQ testing is geographic screening of toxins. For example, lead paints and lead as a fuel additive cause over a large sample a cumulative drop in IQ of 4 points. The statistics actually were the way this negative health effect was discovered in 1979. Testing for lead in the body that has replaced calcium isn't otherwise easy test (requires bone sample, or cleverly, kids' baby teeth).

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/g-pro...

tomaskafka• 7 years ago

I have done some research into a budget home CO2/PM2.5/VOC sensor, and if you don't mind sending data to China, Cleargrass Air has awesome functionality in a nice design (plus mobile app) for about $130

https://www.google.com/search?q=cleargrass+air&ie=UTF-8&oe=U...

ultrasounder• 7 years ago

Wow!. I just browsed through Patrick's reading list. NO wonder people who actively follow him and know-him personally call him the "Most erudite Man" of our times. Kinda like Umberto Eco from Black Swan.

Wegiangb• 7 years ago

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-50467700

The cognitive costs of air pollution

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