From the Department of Obvious Science and the “don’t you have anything better to do with our tax dollars” department comes this pointless study. Gotta love the zinger at the end about the EPA not regulating fireworks emissions (yet). I’d like to see them try, because that might just be the bridge too far for that unaccountable federal agency.
Nationwide study measures short-term spike in July 4 particulate matter
Particulate matter linked to short and long-term health effects
From NOAA Headquarters:
From our nation’s founding, the Fourth of July has been synonymous with fireworks.
While many grew up learning that fireworks can be dangerous to the eyes and hands if not handled properly, fireworks also produce air pollutants, including particulate matter, that are linked to short-term or long-term health effects.
NOAA scientist Dian Seidel and Abigail Birnbaum, a student intern at NOAA, have authored a new study appearing in the journal Atmospheric Environment that quantifies the surge in fine particulate matter -particles that are two and one half microns in diameter (PM2.5) -on July 4, using observations from the 315 U.S. air quality monitoring sites that operated from 1999 to 2013. While scientists have known that fireworks displays produce a surge in fine particulates, the new study is the first nationwide quantitative analysis of the effects.
“We chose the holiday, not to put a damper on celebrations of America’s independence, but because it is the best way to do a nationwide study of the effects of fireworks on air quality,” said Seidel, a senior scientist at NOAA’s Air Resources Laboratory in College Park, Maryland. “These results will help improve air quality predictions, which currently don’t account for fireworks as a source of air pollution. The study is also another wake up call for those who may be particularly sensitive to the effects of fine particulate matter.”
PM2.5 are microscopic particles that can affect health because they travel deep into a person’s respiratory tract, entering the lungs. Both long- and short-term exposures to fine particles are linked to a range of health effects – from coughing, wheezing and shortness of breath, to asthma attacks, heart attack and stroke, and premature death in people with heart or lung disease. People with heart or lung disease, older adults, and children are among those most at risk from particle pollution exposure. For more information on risks, go online to the Environmental Protection Agency at: http://www.epa.gov/airquality/particlepollution/2012/decfshealth.pdf
The new research shows that hourly concentrations of fine particulate matter typically reach their highest levels, when compared to the days before and after July 4, on the evening of July 4. Levels drop back down by noon on July 5, according to the research. On average, the increases are largest from 9-10 p.m. on the holiday. Average concentrations over the 24-hour period starting at 8 p.m. on July 4 are 42 percent greater than on the days preceding and following the holiday.
Increases in fine particulate matter concentrations varied from location to location, due to how close the fireworks were to the monitoring site and variations in weather conditions. At one location, where fireworks are set off in a field adjacent to air quality monitoring instruments, particulate matter concentrations rose 370 percent on the holiday, well above the 24-hour fine particle standard of 35 micrograms per cubic meter.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s rules accommodate the tradition of using fireworks on the Fourth of July and at other cultural events, by allowing states to demonstrate that the short-term PM2.5 spikes measured on July 4 and 5 were influenced by fireworks display and should not be used in determining whether an area has violated the agency’s 24-hour PM2.5 standards.
And while the EPA does not regulate fireworks, the agency does recommend that people who are considered sensitive to particle pollution try to limit their exposure by watching fireworks from upwind – or as far away as possible. People with asthma should follow their asthma action plans and be sure to have their quick relief medicine handy.
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Let’s not forget that our ancestors heated with and cooked over fires and must have breathed in massive amounts of particulate matter. They burned candles and oil lamps indoors. A year of breathing in this environment probably exposed them to more particulate matter than most Americans today, breath in during their life time.
Of course that doesn’t mean that it’s ok to breathe some particulate matter from time to time, just that we should put things into perspective. Our air is pretty dang clean, especially compared to the pilgrims indoor environment.
The invention/use of catalytic convertors and air pollution scrubbers improved outdoor air quality a great deal after the Industrial Revolution.
Today, we have redefined air pollution. The target is now focused on reducing a beneficial gas because of which, there has been a cumulative number of premature deaths(from breathing ambient atmospheric levels of it) of zero. If emissions of CO2 continue to rise, by the year 2100, there will be a cumulative number of premature deaths of zero from breathing ambient atmospheric levels of it. Respiratory complications from humans and the entire animal kingdom from breathing these elevated levels of ambient atmospheric levels of CO2 will also be zero.
Plants?
Sunshine +H2O +CO2 + Minerals =O2 + Sugars(food)
I don’t know what the hell they were measuring or what for. Drop this “result” into the not-worth-the-paper file. Anyway, whenever I hear fireworks discussed I am reminded of the several years I lived in Honolulu. Every holiday from Chinese New Year to 4th of July was an overwhelming din. There were fireworks going off everywhere, and I do mean everywhere. Trash cans, telephone poles, street curbs, lanais, everywhere. Dang, now that was some particulate. I remember walking through the tunnel to get into Diamond Head Crater to watch a concert when somehow a lit rope of firecrackers ended up inside a car. The people in the car got out rather fast. You should have seen the particulates!
Normally the government tells us we can’t light off fireworks, because they are dangerous, a woman on TV the other day said “don’t buy, don’t touch them, don’t go near, don’t set them off, they could KILL you.” But it seem to me that if they increase particulate matter and particulate matter causes cooling we should set off fireworks everyday.
California Coastal Commission leads the way with raining on fireworks. See Gualala (small CA coastal city) Festivals Committee vs. CCC:
http://lawzilla.com/blog/gualala-festivals-committee-v-california-coastal-commission/
A fireworks display is (gasp!) development, just not development as we know it:
“Although such a display may not be a “development” in the ordinary sense of the word, the Commission’s interpretation conforms both with the expansive statutory definition of the term and the purpose of the statute. Hence we shall affirm the trial court’s judgment upholding the Commission’s action.”
The CCC used Guillemot bird nesting to support its decision. The statistics were not statistics as we know them. The following are excerpts from a real statistician colleague’s review of CCC “statistics”
…can’t believe what can pass for science…
…no control site, so there are many potential confounding factors…
…Maybe…this would happen with or without fireworks…
…interesting that there are no nests with newly visible chicks until July 5…
…no reasonable way to conclude that the nest abandonment “likely resulted from fireworks disturbance”.
…The collection of data also seems strange – is it really that nests were only observed May 30, June 5, July 5, July 7 and July 12? If so, then you don’t really know the time period over which the failures occurred. Suppose the following occurred:
6 of 90 (6.7%) abandonments July 3 – July 5 (but all were before fireworks)
7 of 88 (8.0%) abandonments July 5 – July 7
7 of 82 (8.5%) abandonments July 7 – July 9
This appears to fit the collected data and shows that there is essentially the same rate of nest abandonment before and after the fireworks.
…no control – if they looked at several sites with and without fireworks and compared them there would be more compelling evidence – as it is there are many other explanations for the clustering of the nest abandonments…
…a problem that different period lengths were considered, but it also seems a problem that we don’t know that the events were uniformly distributed across the periods, so that as I mentioned before there could be a clustering of events in a short period of time, although the measuring technique makes it look like a long period of time…
…lack of comparison to another area without fireworks and only considering one area (essentially a sample size of 1)…
…use the Coastal Commission logic to argue that there were more nests with newly visible chicks immediately following the fireworks and therefore the fireworks must have caused these new chicks to appear…
I added this evaluation:
…The bird study was conducted from May to August 2007 and released 12 February 2008. Where are the studies for 2006, 2005, etc.? Where is the study for 2008? Will there be a study for 2009? In the absence of corroborating or continuing studies, one might suspect an ad hoc results-based approach focused on Gualala’s fireworks issue.
Let’s be frank. NOAA has really lost it this time ! 🙂
If the EPA’s junk science had an iota of truth to it there would be millions of Chinese dropping dead every day.
It could be happening and no one is in the West would notice. That is a sad note on both China’s population size and its press freedoms.
Just a cotton pick’n minute. Last I heard aerosols were the only things saving us from inexorable radiative forcing. Everything we do is evil. Let’s make a pact with the devil and blast the hell out of Independence Day to save the planet.
The sad thing is that there are government scientists who really think this is worth looking into. We have created a nation of timid, pathetic individuals. This is NOT our greatest generation.
I’ll drink to that (in moderation of course) sarc off
I think this is just an incremental step towards a national ban on 4th of July fireworks. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the real reason for this ban (should it happen) is that liberals don’t like patriotism.
I propose to punish the Chinese Government, retrospectively, for having allowed the invention of fireworks!!
A tax on the Chinese Government every time Fireworks are used would be a start. Now I need Funding to see how we are going to collect the tax…….
I guess we are supposed to ignore that the EPA tried to show that their feared particulate matter was lethal by exposing some test subjects (without telling them that they were expected to die) to high levels of particulates. When the subjects were fine, the EPA buried the study, but someone outed them and they were chastised in subsequent Congressional hearings. However, the EPA persists in pretending that there are widespread health effects and will not let it go until they find some way to use it against us.
An assault on independence day? Go figure from this administration …—…
We forget, so quickly, why we fought for the freedom we have from such bureaucracy. . .
The smell of fireworks in the night air on the 4th of July… it smells like….. Freedom.
Progressives hate that smell.
You said it, Joel!
Being a human being for one day incurs a 0.0003 % risk of death.
Sorry – it’s 0.003% – it’s worse than we thought!
Got this from a mole I have at the local electric company. There is a large spike in electric usage on one particular day of the year, at one particular hour – “Earth Hour.”
Barack Obama has been the best thing ever for firearms sales in this country.
If this latest idiocy gains traction in the media – expect fireworks sales to EXPLODE.
If you expected me to resist that one…
I see the “Nanny State” is not restricted to UK.
I have fond memories of life before nannyism, I used to buy sodium chlorate weedkiller and make my own fireworks until its sale was banned.
Apparently the sense of smell evokes the strongest memories, the smell of fireworks and bonfires on 5th November is a smell that still brings back childhood and early fatherhood memories. In the future when I am heating and cooking with dried dung because the wind isn’t blowing or the sun is not shining I don’t think this smell will be worth reminiscing!
Play it safe on the4th. Don’t buy a 5th on the 3rd.
We were talking just recently about the need for generalists in science and life in general.
A scientifically literate generalist would have had no difficult comprehending the causes of this terrible accident on Fireworks Night in the UK.
Whilst the cause is almost definitely a cloud/fog condensation nucleated by low level drifting smoke particles. Plus conditions of low level temperature inversion causing both the saturated air AND the tendency for the smoke to drift at low level. These principles were not easily grasped by either the media or the authorities at the time.
That’s my casual assessment. And I’m just a nobody.
The public discussion of the event seemed to remain stuck on the pointless debate as to whether the accident was caused by smoke, or was it caused by fog.
If not smoke, then surely fog. If not fog then surely smoke was the cause, etc.
Ultimately, I doubt that anything was learned. Which was a shame, because this kind of accident can now happen again at any time.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/apr/17/firework-smoke-not-blame-fatal-pile-up-motorway-coroner
Has this “link” been demonstrated? …or merely postulated?
The founders of this country encouraged citizens to celebrate their independence with fireworks and now the EPA allows the states to set off fireworks. A regulation just waiting to be tweaked.
Don’t particulates cause cooling? If global warming is such a threat, any activities with a cooling effect should be encouraged …
Is Small Particle Air Pollution Really Killing Americans?
No.
http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/01/is-small-particle-air-pollution-really-killing-americans-no/
https://twitter.com/hockeyschtick1/status/615987410422202368