What do we breathe while driving?

2024 Author: James Gerald | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 14:00

In recent years, there has been an increase in the incidence of chronic respiratory diseases in Moscow: chronic bronchitis, bronchial asthma and allergic rhinitis. Environmental scientists and doctors attribute this to a sharp increase in the number of vehicles. The car is the main source of environmental pollution. Even a child knows this. Two million cars emit 32 thousand tons of harmful substances every day. But the environment … it seems to be somewhere far away, outside the windshield, and here in the cabin, you are completely safe. Far from it! Without wasting intimidating phrases, let's go over the main sources of danger in a car. Svetlana Aleksandrovna Savina, Technical Director of Ecology of Living Space LLC, helped me to figure this out.

Salon

The driver's health is harmed not only by the polluted air of the street entering the passenger compartment through the ventilation system, but also by substances released from materials and objects located directly inside the car. Therefore, when buying, you need to be interested not only in the external beauty of a new car, but also in the composition of its inner upholstery and panels, as well as carefully read the labels when buying car care products, auto cosmetics.

The most common substances released from polymeric materials for interior trim are phenol, formaldehyde, xylene, solvents and other volatile compounds that are part of paints, varnishes, enamels, and adhesives. Unfortunately, the cars do not indicate the full composition of finishing materials and paints used for the interior, so there are many "surprises": phenol in seat trim and filler, aromatic hydrocarbons, xylene and toluene from paints and varnishes, aromatic compounds from artificial leather interior, aldehydes, amines, acetone, chlorides from synthetic fabrics.

When choosing a car, you need to check it for the presence of strong odors and their accumulation in the cabin. It is advisable to sit in a closed car with the engine turned on and off, then ventilate the interior and trace the accumulation of odor. If after 15-20 minutes after airing the smell becomes strong again, then, most likely, the materials of the interior trim are not very high quality.

It is important to choose quality car care products. Attention should be paid to those types of liquids, the vapors of which can enter the passenger compartment, for example, windshield washer fluid. Due to inadequate control over the composition of these fluids, methanol is often present in them. In the form of vapor, it causes irritation of the mucous membranes, dizziness, pain and even convulsions. Therefore, it is necessary to check the composition on the label and avoid methanol-containing liquids. Since 2000, the production of methanol-based windscreen washers has been banned. It is better to use ethanol-based liquids, they are less toxic. Isopropanol based fluids often have a very strong perfume to overcome the acetone odor of isopropanol.

In order to avoid toxic emissions, it is important to properly store car hygiene products: uncovered canister lids can increase the concentration of harmful substances in the cabin air several times.

Brakes invented by a coward?

During braking, brake pads release into the atmosphere a whole bunch of harmful chemicals and dust: copper, vanadium, zinc, molybdenum, nickel and chromium. And inhalation of asbestos, which is also part of the pads, often leads to cancer. Lead used in the manufacture of friction linings is no less dangerous. But most of all, phenol is harmful to human health, released at the time of prolonged or sharp braking from hot pads, when the temperature of the disc and pads reaches eight hundred degrees. In order to prevent all these harmful vapors from seeping into the inside of the car, they came up with filters. They really help, but only when the interior is completely sealed from outside air. The frequency of filter replacement depends on their technical characteristics.

Some people believe that technical wonders such as air conditioning and ionizers purify the cabin air. Delusion! The air conditioner simply cools the air entering it, it can be cabin air or street air with all the impurities.

And it is better not to use an air ionizer in the car at all. Ionization of polluted air - additional harm to health! Complex, more harmful substances are formed from simple, less harmful substances under the influence of ionization. Only ionized clean air is useful. And how could he be in the car?

Don't pull the rubber!

But still the main "supplier" of carcinogens to the environment - who would have thought! - are not exhaust gases, as is commonly believed, but tires from cars. Generally, tires and rubber components are not dangerous by themselves. However, from tire wear on the surface of the roads and next to them, a large amount of dust settles, destroying our lungs, and other organs as well. About 60% of the particles formed during tire tread wear and released into the air easily penetrate the respiratory tract and cause allergic reactions, bronchial asthma, and on contact with the mucous membrane and skin - conjunctivitis, rhinitis and urticaria.

When braking, car tires also emit products that are detrimental to human health: benzene, xylene, styrene, toluene; carbon disulfide, formaldehyde, phenols; sulfur oxides and other toxic substances with complex and frightening names. Up to 120 substances harmful to living organisms. Now imagine: in a city like Moscow, several hundred tons of tire dust per hour is emitted into the atmosphere, mainly deposited on and near highways.

Fine rubber dust persists for a long time on the road surface and on the soil. In dry weather, it rises into the air and flies straight into our respiratory organs - whether we decided to walk on foot along the side of the Moscow Ring Road or wanted to drive a car. By the way, such tire dust remains in the body for a long time.

The amount of tire dust generated also depends not only on the quality of the tires, but also on the correct adjustment of the car's running gear, driving style, compliance with the operating rules, etc. Much less tire dust is generated when the tread is evenly worn out.

The studies carried out show that one of the significant sources of undesirable processes is the rolling resistance of tires. As tires age, the amount of dust increases.

Are you going cleaner - will you continue?

When buying windshield washer fluid, carefully look at the label: the composition should not contain methanol (popularly known as methyl alcohol)! This is a dangerous poisonous substance, therefore, recently, as mentioned earlier, it has been banned by the Ministry of Health for use in Russia. Inhalation of methanol vapors causes irritation of the mucous membranes, dizziness, pain, convulsions. When taken orally, it causes severe, life-threatening poisoning, and those who survive may lose their eyesight due to damage to the optic nerve.

It turns out that most low-freezing liquids for car window washers are made on the basis of methyl alcohol! Unscrupulous manufacturers simply do not indicate its presence on the label. The methanol content can be up to 30% of the liquid volume. The fact is that manufacturers often produce these liquids using their own technologies from the most affordable raw materials. If obviously harmless products are not available to you for some reason, it is better to fill the washer tank with a "cocktail" of cheap vodka and any detergent.

According to the Scientific Research Institute of Occupational Medicine, which conducted research to determine the concentration of methanol vapors in the passenger compartment of a car in which a poor quality anti-freeze was used, at the time of parking, the concentration of vapors exceeds the maximum permissible norm by 7 times! While driving, the indicators improved, but not much. In such conditions, headache and distraction become constant companions of the driver.

Use only certified products that comply with the established documentation in the operation of the car, choose fluids that have a label indicating the manufacturer and the date of production.

Noise

Road transport, like rail transport, is the main source of noise in large cities. And this is a problem not only for the residents of roadside houses, but also for the drivers themselves. The noise level in road transport is 72-92 dB. By the way, at 50 dB, the period of falling asleep of a person increases by an hour or more. After such a background noise of the day, you are unlikely to get a good and high-quality sleep. In such cases, after waking up, people feel fatigue, headache, and often a rapid heartbeat. Regular lack of adequate rest prevents the body from recovering after a working day and, as a result, leads to chronic overwork - one of the most common causes of many diseases. In addition, constant fatigue negatively affects a person's ability to safely drive a car.

It is possible to reduce the harm of road noise by making noise insulation in the car or by reducing the vibration of the car. It is also undesirable to use a straight-through muffler: this increases the noise of low frequencies, which affects the human nervous system.

Gaza Strip

And don't forget about the exhaust fumes. When gasoline burns - and this is the fuel that most private cars use - more than 200 toxic products are released! The most harmful of them are carbon and nitrogen oxides, organic compounds (formaldehyde, benzpyrene, phenol) and heavy metals. In Russia, only the content of carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons in exhaust gases is standardized, and for diesel cars - smoke (soot).

The fact is that the concentration of harmful emissions is greatest at an altitude of 50-150 cm from the earth's surface, that is, just at the level of the human respiratory system. Carbon monoxide (or carbon monoxide) is colorless and odorless, so a person may not feel its presence in the air even at lethal concentrations. Carbon monoxide forms a strong compound with hemoglobin, depriving it of the ability to carry oxygen through organs and tissues, which can lead to oxygen starvation, from which the brain primarily suffers. The first signs of poisoning: headache, heaviness in the head, weakness, slower reaction in the driver, dizziness, nausea, vomiting. In more severe cases, you may even lose consciousness. Carbon monoxide is produced by incomplete combustion of carbon in fuel. Its high concentration in the car - which is sometimes forgotten by negligent drivers, turning on the engine for heating and falling asleep, stopping for the night outside the city - can lead to death even with short-term exposure. In a one-seater garage, a lethal concentration of carbon monoxide occurs within two to three minutes after turning on the starter.

Even in clear weather, when driving on a busy highway, the air seems foggy, and the cloudless sky is not blue, but rather gray. The main cause of urban smog is nitrogen oxides, which are formed during the combustion of any type of fuel - natural gas, coal, gasoline or fuel oil. They irritate the respiratory system and eyes and can cause chronic lung diseases. At intersections and at traffic lights, as well as when standing in traffic jams, the emissions of these substances are several times greater than when driving on a highway. This is where the cause of many chronic diseases lies. At a critical concentration of nitrogen dioxide, for example in closed rooms (garages), pulmonary edema occurs, leading to death.

And, of course, heavy metals. Gasoline produced in Russia still contains lead compounds. Their main danger is not only that they are carcinogenic, but also that these substances accumulate in the body, creating dangerous concentrations. Research in the United States has shown that, prior to the ban on leaded gasoline, there was a clear decline in IQ in children in urban areas with high levels of exhaust gas. And the reason for this is lead vapors. Scientists note that heavy metals, especially lead, are very densely concentrated along highways, exceeding background levels by 10-20 times and maintaining an increased background up to 120 meters away from these highways.

So it's time to switch to bicycles and leave to live out of town. Of course, this is impossible - you argue. Sometimes without a car as without hands. Agree. But still try to secure yourself as much as possible while driving your beloved "horse". To paraphrase Socrates, we can say about the car: "The car is my friend, but health is more expensive!"

For the good of your health, it is also important to undergo timely maintenance of the car, timely replacement of worn parts, fluids, oils, filters, etc.