Tibet, the highest region on Earth and one of the most remote, is associated with vivid blue skies and the crystal clear air of the Himalayas. During the long cold season, however, the traditional nomadic people spend much of their time in snug dwellings where they cook and stay warm by burning yak dung. Their indoor air can be filled with dangerous levels of fine particulate matter, including black carbon, a new study finds.
The journal Atmospheric Environment published the research, led by Eri Saikawa, an assistant professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences at Emory University and in the Department of Environmental Health at the Rollins School of Public Health.
“Indoor air pollution is a huge human health problem throughout the developing world,” Saikawa says. “In a cold region like Tibet, the impact on individuals could be even greater because they spend so much time indoors and try to keep their homes as air tight as possible.”
Globally, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that 4.3 million people died prematurely in 2012 due to indoor air pollution from traditional stoves, fueled by coal, wood, dung or crop waste. In comparison, WHO estimated that outdoor air pollution was linked to 3.7 million deaths that year.
Tibet is situated on a plateau northeast of the Himalayas in China. For centuries, nomadic people there have herded yaks, large, long-haired relatives of cattle. Yaks work as pack animals and supply meat, milk, and fiber for fabrics. They also generate heating fuel in the form of dung.
Previous studies had looked at indoor air quality in Tibet during the summer season. Saikawa and her team wanted to investigate indoor emissions during the colder months.
In March of 2013, Qingyang Xiao, a graduate student in Rollins School of Public Health, traveled to the Tibetan region of Nam Co (which means “heavenly lake”) to gather the data. About 4,500 residents live in the region, at an altitude of 4,730 meters.
Xiao used battery powered aerosol monitors to measure indoor concentrations of fine particulate matter, or particles 2.5 micrometers in diameter or smaller, which consists mainly of black carbon and organic carbon. She recorded the measurements in six households with different living conditions and stove types. Yak dung was the main fuel for cooking and the only fuel for heating.
The results showed that the average concentrations for black carbon and fine particulate matter were nearly double those reported by some similar studies of households in areas of lower altitude and warmer climates, such as India and Mexico.
The Tibetan homes included four traditional tents and two simple stone houses. Both the tents and the houses had only one room where all of the family members slept, ate and cooked.
Three of the families used traditional open stoves without chimneys, and three had added chimneys to their stoves. A simple house with a chimney had the lowest indoor concentrations. This household lived on tourism and used liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) for cooking.
However, a stone house with a chimney had the highest black carbon concentrations.
“That was surprising,” Saikawa says. “It shows that it is misleading to think that having a chimney will always improve the situation, unless you can be sure that the home is ventilated correctly and that you have proper air flow within a dwelling.”
Xiao also surveyed members of 23 households on energy use and awareness of indoor air pollution. The families said they spent an average of 16 hours a day indoors during the colder months of the year.
Seventy percent of those surveyed said that they were aware of the health problems associated with indoor air pollution, and some of them did not have the economic means to purchase a chimney. (The average annual income per household is less than $900 a year, and a chimney costs around $60.)
The moisture content of the yak dung is another key factor in the emission levels, Saikawa says. After a rain or snowfall, the piles of uncovered dung are moist, leading to incomplete combustion and more emissions of fine particulate matter due to increased organic carbon by smoldering.
“It’s a complicated issue,” Saikawa says. “It’s much more than just a science problem. You have to understand how people live if you want to help find solutions to improve their lives.”
The Emory research team, including students from environmental sciences and the Rollins School of Public Health, is expanding on the small sample of households in this initial study. They are investigating indoor emissions in other areas of Tibet and plan to link these measurements to a biomarker study based on blood samples of people living in the households.
Saikawa, a specialist in atmospheric chemistry, is also studying levels of black carbon emissions in the outdoor environment generated by the burning of biomass fuels like yak dung.
Black carbon absorbs heat in the atmosphere and reduces the ability to reflect sunlight when deposited on snow and ice. Its impact is greatest at high altitudes. “Black carbon emissions from burning biofuel such as yak dung have not been quantified before in the atmosphere of the Himalayas,” Saikawa says. “We know that many Himalayan glaciers are melting rapidly, and our work suggests that more black carbon is getting deposited on them than previously thought.”
She hopes to eventually work with Georgia Tech engineer Jonathan Colton to develop gasifier cook stoves that would burn yak dung in a more efficient matter, producing fewer emissions. The stove would need to be portable, to suit the nomadic way of life, affordable for the Tibetans and simple to maintain.
“We want to use our data to make the world a better place,” Saikawa says. “The ultimate goal is to reduce pollution from biomass fuels in ways that benefit human health and reduce the climate impact.”
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I was wondering about the photo for a bit…was it a plate of soy burgers or Yak dung patties?
How would you know? They taste the same….
You speak from experience, Mac?
Obama and his EPA need to get active on this world issue! They might consider a treaty that will prohibit this bad habit. Indeed let them suffer the global warming agenda and freeze to death as opposed to harming not only themselves but our planet! I am not sure about how to include the sarc notation or if it appropriate.
Tibet is now part of China, hence need not comport with any climate treaties.
The EPA is already active in this through the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves which is an initiative of Hillary Clinton, through the United Nations Foundation (look it up before assuming what it is) in turn through the State Department (when she was Secretary).
The EPA is represented on the ANSI team of 28 people participating in ISO Technical Committee 285 ‘Clean cookstoves and clean cooking solutions’. An EPA staffer is the ANSI team lead and casts the votes. They basically propose an All-American solution which for a few years was assumed to be improved biomass stoves. However that changed when it was revealed by Hillary in November that the long term plan is to move everyone to LPG and electricity and end all solid fuel combustion.
The EPA under Bush and Obama supported their Partnership for Clean Indoor Air with two minor staffers and still maintain a legacy website.
The EPA’s war on coal obviously extends to coal stoves needed in North Asia. Not sure what that will lead to as there is nothing else to burn in most places.
I am in Ulaanbaatar at the moment and if you don’t burn coal and you are poor, you die. Quickly, not from air pollution.
Improved combustion in domestic stoves has cleared the city air of about 50% of ambient PM2.5 in the past 3 years – through a stove replacement programme. I believe it is the first time, ever, that a city has substantially cleaned it’s air without changing the fuel. Much more can and is still being done.
“Globally, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that 4.3 million people died prematurely in 2012 due to indoor air pollution from traditional stoves, fueled by coal, wood, dung or crop waste. In comparison, WHO estimated that outdoor air pollution was linked to 3.7 million deaths that year.”
And the number that died prematurely or otherwise from breathing increased levels of ambient atmospheric carbon dioxide pollution…………………..Zero.
And the increase in global temperature from the accelerating increase of CO2 over the past 15+ years………..slightly more than zero.
More importantly:
The estimated increase of value in crop yields/world food production from increasing CO2 over the last 50 years?
That number also has some zero’s in it too……….. 12 to be exact. However, they come before the decimal point.
$3,000,000,000,000+
That would be over 3 trillion dollars.
http://www.co2science.org/education/reports/co2benefits/MonetaryBenefitsofRisingCO2onGlobalFoodProduction.pdf
What is the number that represents money spent for grants, research, taxes, technology, government programs and so on to study and address carbon dioxide pollution?
That number also has at least 12 zeros to the left of the decimal point.
So I guess increasing carbon dioxide is a break even game.
The huge value of benefits bestowed by CO2 to society are almost completely offset by the huge cost to society from those using it to fund their anti CO2 endeavors.
Ironic.
This would be like winning a trillion dollars in the lottery and simultaneously, declaring that $100 bills are dangerous to handle and must be studied.
Research includes:
1. Measuring the amount of emissions from burning various sized piles of 100 dollar bills.
2. Testing the buoyancy of $100 bills by dumping them into deep bodies of water and determining the length of time before they can no longer be detected on the surface.
3. Measuring how many $100 bills it takes to wipe your ass and studying the pattern of them as they are flushed down the toilet.
I’ll see your $3 trillion and . . .
I drove across the USA last summer to hang out around Yellowstone (and fish for wiggly water creatures) and I stopped and ate and visited in diners. Farmer told me he only harvested 12 or so bushels of soy beans/acre a couple of years ago, but this year has been 75-98 bushels/acre. Iowa was stunningly beautiful cropland, except for those stupid wind machines. Of course this was the warmest year in planetary history. Commented on N Y Times digest of devastations last 2 nights. One with simply a link to WUWT. Gonged both nights. Sorry for rambling, but the breadbasket was a stunner. I’d worked out there in my youth so had some basis for comp.
oh and the value of the crops plummeted. Great way to treat those who feed us.
If the greens get their way, someday we’ll be using those $100 bills to light our yak dung fires.
All you get from that lot is yak yak yak
Okay, no chimney?
Makes sense, you want all the heat.
A further problem in a cold climate is humidity, just heat means very dry air. Ventilation with water recovery is not so easy.
Not so long ago in the UK it was common to use oil heaters with no flue. Still fairly common with gas.
Try building them some damned nuclear power plants! Remember the AEC? They had a project, outfiting Liberty Ships with reactors. I thought it was a “concept only”. Then I found this about 4 years ago. It’s been updated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MH-1A
no shit?
At the risk of belabouring matters. Say you had 300 Liberty ship Nuclear Plants. They could have done WONDERS around the world. Say one (or two or three) of them has a “problem”. Well, you tow it out to the deep ocean and SINK IT…as the Thresher and the Scorpion. Both found, both with minimal detected leakage from the reactor. RIP Thresher and Scorpion! But the net gain in helping around the world, invaluable.
All in all, a very good argument for expanded use of natural gas. Let thousands of years of natural processes refine the organic matter before you burn it.
Seriously?? They were paid for this?? Someone (taxpayers I’ll bet) wasted a bundle on such obvious drivel. Geesh!
I know, I know, just yakking it up.
Thus the importance of publicizing “The Moral Case For Fossil Fuels”.
Rather than state the obvious, Bjorn Lomborg offers solutions:
Better stoves can reduce indoor pollution
Not gonna happen. Never. Way too much sense and not in-line with the “program”.
U tube…Rocket stoves….looks like a good idea for Tibet ?
Thanks for that, SOB!
Found this web site ‘interesting’. A little bit on the ‘old hippie’ side, but interesting low tech designs for max heat extraction and retention! This may be a viable heater for my detached garage… and a ‘safe’ place to try out a bit more engineered design. The videos waaaaay down the site are more informative about designs and building…..
Mac
http://www.richsoil.com/rocket-stove-mass-heater.jsp
As I watch through the glass doors of my wood-burning stove the great quantity of thermal energy returning to space, I enjoy the toasty warmth that fills my house.
Any recrimination about the inefficiency of the stove is overwhelmed by the knowledge of how the entire planet is squandering the energy it is receiving on an on-going basis, spitting back everything it receives like there’s no tomorrow.
It is interesting that the Dené people of NW North America didn’t figure out pottery, metals or wheels but they had pretty good chimney systems in all their habitations. Meanwhile people in warmer climes still squint through the haze in their convection-impaired dwellings.
Luckily all the energy that there ever was in this universe is and always will be, it just has a thing about staying in the same place for very long.
You could probably sell that stuff by the gram in Boulder Seattle, and they would indeed smoke it, thinking somehow it was a good natural high.
I hate to say this but those look a heckuvalot like hamburger patties.
Not the way I make ’em!
Want flies with that?
My first thought was chocolate-chip cookies.
We’ll since the IPCC is concerned with all global issues concerning energy from fossil fuels to cow dung, they will immediately put a carbon tax on dung and crop waste in addition to coal.
Isn’t this why we tried to start electrifying villages in Africa with solar panels in the late 80’s?
Yes it is, Other prjindigo, yes it is…
Burning yak dung can be done very cleanly by creating the combustion conditions that provide adequate preheating of the primary air supply and enough flame space above the fuel to complete the breakdown of the longest molecules.
This was demonstrated by a team of Engineers Without Borders from Colorade State Univ in Tibet a few years ago who burned yak dung at elevations above 13,000 ft. They were investigating the performance of a semi-gasifier at high altitude. They reported that it burned very well. Semi-gasifiers can be refuelled while gasifiers typically are ‘batch stoves’.
The problem is not burning yak dung, it is NOT burning it completely. This is not a mystery. Dung is a very good fuel. Prakti Design in India also has a novel stove specifically designed to burn dung well.
Chimney stoves are a very effective and semi-permanent method of dramatically improving indoor air quality. This has been known for centuries.
The number of ‘deaths’ from indoor air is surprising. I believe the correct metric is not ‘deaths’ but ADALYs or DALYs which is a measurement of ‘life years’ not deaths. The reference would be the WHO’s 12 November 2014 publication. The claimed number of DALYs has been approximately doubled every 18 months which is itself curious as the number of people burning biofuels remains approximately constant.
Looking into the documents cited by the WHO one finds there is no new data. There are citations of still other documents. In those source documents one finds far more uncertainty than is presented by the WHO. The number is ‘0-4.2 million DALYs’ not ‘4.2’ and not ‘deaths’. So am I misinterpreting the sources? The roots? Maybe, maybe not. Let each read and see. Perhaps my eyes deceive me. What ever the number is, it is quite a leap to take ‘0-4.2m’ and turn it into 4.2m at the stroke of a delete key.
Similarly, looking into the root citations of the estimated influence of poor air quality outdoor air one finds 0-2.2m and 0-1.5m and so on. This is a very uncertain field where the numbers seem to have a life of their own.
One of the most curious numbers is that of the claimed required decrease in exposure needed to create a significant, measurable decrease in disease attributable to PM2.5. It is frequently claimed that a reduction of 90% or more is needed to get a solid positive health response. That is for decreases. For increases, however, the effects are claimed to be linear. Thus increasing PM2.5 by 100% has immediate and measurable deleterious effects, but reducing it again by half to the original level creates no measurable reduction. That is illogical. They can’t have it both ways.
Exposure to PM2.5 (particles with an aerodynamic diameter of less than 2.5 microns) at a low level has no detectable effect. We deal with it. Above this limit, health effects can be detected, and the effects are assumed to increase as the dose increases. That makes sense. Translating that into ‘deaths’ is a dark art, however. That is why there are such huge ranges in the estimates. I don’t think anyone is brave enough to claim that 4.2 million people died from the effects of poor indoor air quality in a journal article.
In order to address this issue internationally Hillary Clinton announced in New York her plan (the event was 20-21 Nov 2014) through the GACC, to eliminate the burning of solid fuels by promoting LPG and electricity for all the poor in the world. It was an interesting coincidence that the WHO announcement of a large increase in the number of DALYs (interpreted as deaths) was announced the week before. Much was made of it.
I would like stove science and indoor air quality to be driven by validated models and sound protocols that provide clear guidance as to what the problem is and what the risk/benefit/cost ratios of various interventions are.
The users of yak dung (which is a very convenient and free fuel) is going to continue for a long time throughout Asia’s grazing lands. The correct interventions are the humble chimney and off the shelf advanced combustion technologies applied in culturally acceptable ways to their cooking and heating needs.
Having had some experience of the use of lpg in developing countries, I would suggest that the Tibetans are a damn sight safer burning yak dung.
Why is it that some people in the ‘developed’ West insist on interfering with the ways of life of others??
We will all die of something………….. in the case of the lucky Tibetans they have little to fear from traffic accidents.
However, I am unsure of the figures relating to injury or death from assault by randy yaks
Actually Yaks are pretty dangerous. A neighbour of mine had his prize stallion gored to death by his long time pasture mate, a bull Yak. No bull. 😉 Probably made a bad pun, Yakkity Yak.
They ought to have started a study on all those folks smoking legalized shit in Colorado and Oregon.
This study is another hint to the rather obvious fact that cold kills far more people than heat. This time not just the cold alone but also the indoor air pollution produced by the need of fighting the cold to survive at all…
What does a non tea-drinker do when presented with a plethora of tea varieties at xmas ?
Accept them with a smile ?
The Boston harbor thing has already been done to death.
So, where does that leave you ?
What does a non tea-drinker do when presented with a plethora of tea varieties at xmas ?
Same thing a carnivore does when presented with a ‘tofu burger’: Politely decline. And ask them to ’embrace diversity’…. by offering a good cup of coffee, with decent splash of scotch in it! Then brew them a proper cup of ‘Irish coffee’ and settle in for a fine and detailed conversation.
‘WHO estimated that outdoor air pollution was linked to 3.7 million deaths that year’ I wonder how they came u with that estimate. Could it have been 0n a computer?.
Yak-poop-for-brains department. Funded by the everloving taxpayers.
This is why I always insist my guests smoke their yak dung outdoors.