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Variation in indoor levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons from burning various biomass types in the traditional grass-roofed households in Western Kenya.

Lisouza FA, Owuor OP, Lalah JO. Department of Chemistry, Maseno University, P.O. Box 333, Maseno 40105, Kenya. lisouzafred@yahoo.com

Biomass burning as fuel in the traditional grass-roofed rural households of Western Province of Kenya in open fire places, in poorly ventilated conditions, lead to accumulation of soot under the roofs. This study characterized and quantified the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in accumulated soot in these households and determined the variation in PAHs concentrations with fuel biomass type. Soot samples collected from the households were extracted, cleaned and analysed by gas chromatography. The PAHs were identified using retention times, verified by gas chromatographic mass spectral analysis and quantified from peak area responses using the internal standard method. The PAHs levels significantly varied (P ≤ 0.05) with biomass type in the order: dung ≥ indigenous trees ≥ exotic trees ≥ shrubs and crop residues. Use of dung and wood from indigenous trees as fuel should be discouraged since they are higher emitters (P ≤ 0.05) of carcinogenic PAHs.

Multiple approaches to evaluate the toxicity of the biomass fuel cow dung (kanda) smoke.

Lal K, Mani U, Pandey R, Singh N, Singh AK, Patel DK, Singh MP, Murthy RC.

Inhalation Toxicology Division, Indian Institute of Toxicology Research, Mahatma Gandhi Marg, PO Box No. 80, Lucknow 226001, U.P, India.

Cow dung (Kanda) is a major source of energy in rural and urban population of developing countries and is burnt in traditional open stoves in confined space of kitchen without proper ventilation. In epidemiological studies, biomass fuel smoke has been reported to be responsible for several respiratory disorders in exposed population.

In a laboratory experiment, female wistar rats were exposed to kanda smoke for 60min/day over a period of 12 weeks. Chemical analysis of smoke showed the presence of PAHs. The increase in CYP1A1, GST-ya, GST-yc expression was found in 12 week exposed lung tissues as compared with controls. The exposure to smoke resulted in significant alteration in the BALF cells in the form of clustering of alveolar macrophages and giant cell formation with vacuolated cytoplasm. The macrophages also showed thickness and villi like projections on the cell surface thus reducing their phagocytic activities.

Histopathological changes in lung tissue were manifested in the form of damage to bronchiolar epithelium, edema and thickening of alveolar septa and emphysema after 4 and 8 week of exposure. These findings suggest that exposure to kanda smoke increases pulmonary tissue damage and may result in various forms ofrespiratory infections in the exposed popultion.

Synopsis: The Fellow will support USAID program development, implementation and coordination of household energy and health initiatives in developing countries. Programmatic and administrative duties will help to ensure quality work addressing the gender, technology, health, environmental, behavioral and socioeconomic implications of household energy use. Domestic and foreign travel for this position is estimated to be between 5% – 20%.

• Franklin Fellows homepage  with instructions on how to apply
• Position description, see  AID 008 under New Positions

Indoor Air Pollution and Blood Pressure in Adult Women Living in Rural China

Link to full-text

Jill Baumgartner, et al.

Background: Almost half the world’s population uses coal and biomass fuels for domestic energy. Limited evidence suggests that exposure to air pollutants from indoor biomass combustion may be associated with elevated blood pressure. Our aim was to assess the relationship between air pollution exposure from indoor biomass combustion and blood pressure in women in rural China.

Methods: We measured 24-hr personal integrated gravimetric exposure to fine particles less than 2.5 microns in aerodynamic diameter (PM2.5) and systolic (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) in the winter and summer among 280 women ≥25 years old living in rural households using biomass fuels in Yunnan, China. We investigated the association between PM2.5 exposure and SBP and DBP using mixed-effects models with random intercepts to account for correlation among repeated measures.

Results: Personal average 24-hr exposure to PM2.5 ranged from 22 to 634 µg/m3 in winter and 9 to 492 µg/m3 in summer. A one log-µg/m3 increase in PM2.5 exposure was associated with 2.2 mmHg (95% CI: 0.8, 3.7; p=0.003) higher SBP and 0.5 mmHg (95% CI: -0.4, 1.3; p=0.31) higher DBP among all women; estimated effects varied by age group. Among women >50 years old, a one log-µg/m3 increase in PM2.5 exposure was associated with 4.1 mmHg (95% CI: 1.5, 6.6; p=0.002) higher SBP and 1.8 mmHg (95% CI: 0.4, 3.2; p=0.01) higher DBP. PM2.5 exposure was positively associated with SBP among younger women, but the association was not statistically significant.

Conclusion: PM2.5 exposure from biomass combustion may be a risk factor for elevated blood pressure, and hence for cardiovascular events. Our findings should be corroborated in longitudinal studies.

Indoor solid fuel use and tuberculosis in China: a matched case-control study

Full-text: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/11/498/abstract

Xiaohong Kan , Chen-Yuan Chiang , Donald A Enarson , Wenhua Chen , Jianan Yang and Genwang Chen

Background - China ranks second among the 22 high burden countries for tuberculosis. A modeling exercise showed that reduction of indoor air pollution could help advance tuberculosis control in China. However, the association between indoor air pollution and tuberculosis is not yet well established. A case control study was conducted in Anhui, China to investigate whether use of solid fuel is associated with tuberculosis.

Methods - Cases were new sputum smear positive tuberculosis patients. Two controls were selected from the neighborhood of each case matched by age and sex using a pre-determined procedure. A questionnaire containing demographic information, smoking habits and use of solid fuel for cooking or heating was used for interview. Solid fuel (coal and biomass) included coal/lignite, charcoal, wood, straw/shrubs/grass, animal dung, and agricultural crop residue. A household that used solid fuel either for cooking and (/or) heating was classified as exposure to combustion of solid fuel (indoor air pollution). Odds ratios and their corresponding 95% confidence limits for categorical variables were determined by Mantel-Haenszel estimate and multivariate conditional logistic regression.

Results - There were 202 new smear positive tuberculosis cases and 404 neighborhood controls enrolled in this study. The proportion of participants who used solid fuels for cooking was high (73.8% among cases and 72.5% among controls). The majority reported using a griddle stove (85.2% among cases and 86.7% among controls), had smoke removed by a hood or chimney (92.0% among cases and 92.8% among controls), and cooked in a separate room (24.8% among cases and 28.0% among controls) or a separate building (67.8% among cases and 67.6% among controls). Neither using solid fuel for cooking (odds ratio (OR) 1.08, 95% CI 0.62-1.87) nor using solid fuel for heating (OR 1.04, 95% CI 0.54-2.02) was significantly associated with tuberculosis. Determinants significantly associated with tuberculosis were household tuberculosis contact (adjusted OR, 27.23, 95% CI 8.19-90.58) and ever smoking tobacco (adjusted OR 1.64, 96% CI 1.01-2.66).

Conclusion - In a population where the majority had proper ventilation in cooking places, the association between use of solid fuel for cooking or for heating and tuberculosis was not statistically significant.

June 24, 2011 – It wasn’t long ago that the people in the region were heating their homes with simple wood fires, filling the homes with almost permanent clouds of smoke.

“Later they began to use simple stoves, but they weren’t very efficient either,” says Hadi Hosseini of Pakistan’s Aga Khan Planning and Building Service (AKPBS), a division of the Aga Khan Development Network which aims to improve the lives of people in rural Pakistan.

Illnesses
“You simply couldn’t see across the room because of the smoke. People just didn’t know how to channel the smoke out. This lead to many respiratory illnesses among villagers, especially children, including cancer and asthma. Something had to be done.”

After seeing similar situations in Nepal, the AKPBS designed a new cooking stove. It contains two main elements – one to cook meals on and one to heat the room. It can also be connected to a water tank to heat and cook water faster than was previously possible.

Cold winters

“Women used to go down to the rivers to do their laundry,” says AKPBS’s Qayum Ali Shah, who comes from the region. “Especially during the cold winters, this was particularly dangerous, as they had to bring their young children with them.”

“You can imagine what it was like to do your laundry in ice cold circumstances with a baby in tow. The women don’t have to do that anymore. They can now simply wash their clothes at home, using the heated water.”

The improvements also included a heat-efficient chimney and an opening in the roof which can be opened or closed to control airflow.

Traditions
While the design and the benefits of the cooking stove seem obvious, it took AKPBS a while to convince the people to actually use it. “This is a very traditional population,” says Mr Hosseini. “Traditions, even domestic ones, go back centuries. To change them, you have to convince people that the new techniques will improve their lives.”

Mr Hosseini and Mr Shah achieved that by simply travelling around the region, demonstrating the stoves’ benefits.

“We’ve engaged the women, we’re working with local entrepreneurs, and we’ve been at roadshows. And the people that we managed to convince have subsequently come along with us to tell others. It’s been a word of mouth promotion.”

Benefits
The benefits of the project go beyond the domestic improvements in people’s homes, Mr Hosseini notes.

“People use wood as fuel. Communities were gathering wood three to four times a week, which lead to massive deforestation in the region, which ultimately leads to a high risk of flooding.  Using our stove, people have reduced their fuel wood consumption by 50 to 60 percent.  So this simple stove is helping to improve their lives AND the environment.”

It’s this element that was noticed by the prestigious Ashden Awards in the UK, which gives an annual award to small scale sustainable energy projects. The AKPBS received an award earlier this month for improving homes and cutting the use of wood for fuel.

Recognition
“It’s good to get this recognition,” says Mr Hosseini. “We go in with a multi-input program: health, education, rural development. The people there are getting a whole package of improvements. That’s not delivered by many stand-alone organizations who only focus on one thing. I think that’s our benefit.”

“We’re offering simple and effective solutions which could also be used elsewhere, even in Western homes. Why not take a step back in our electronic and manufactured approach of cooking? People everywhere could learn a lot from these things.”

http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/energy-efficient-stoves-clear-pakistan%E2%80%99s-air

Household fuel use and acute respiratory infections among younger children: an exposure assessment in Shebedino Wereda, Southern Ethiopia

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Biruck Desalegn, Hammed Suleiman

Background: the health impacts of exposure to indoor air pollution have yet to become a central focus of research, development aid and policy-making.

Objective: To investigate the effect of household fuel use on acute respiratory infection in younger children at Shebedino Wereda.

Study method: The study design was cross-sectional, which employed an exposure assessment approach, collecting detailed primary data on several household-level exposure indicators (fuel type, stove type, kitchen type, housing type, ventilation, etc.) through the administration of a questionnaire in 405 households. Data were collected during January to February 2006.

Result: The response rate for the sampled households was 100%. ARI prevalence of the study area (21%) was found to be lower as compared to the national figure in 2000 (24%). The study approach appears to demonstrate a relatively consistent association between child handling practice while cooking and childhood ARI.

Conclusion: The existing environmental and socioeconomic factor in the study area has a considerable potential to contribute for environmental threats to the health of children. An obvious implication is that educating the public about the adverse effects of cooking smoke on child health and on good child handling practice through community participation is essential.

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Abebe Damte, Steven F. Koch. University of Pretoria

The heavy dependence and inefficient utilization of biomass resources for energy have resulted in high depletion of the forest resources in Ethiopia, while the use of traditional cooking technology, one source of inefficient biomass resource use, has been linked to indoor air pollution and poor health. In response, the government and other institutions have pushed for the adoption of new cooking technologies.

This research examines the speed of adoption of some of these technologies – Mirt and Lakech cook stoves – in urban Ethiopia. The duration analysis suggests that adoption rates have been increasing over time, that income and wealth are important contributors to adoption, and that substitute technologies tend to hinder adoption. However, it was not possible to consider prices or perceptions related to either the technologies or biomass availability in the duration models, and, therefore, further research is needed in order to further inform policy with respect to household technology adoption decisions.