Green Options

Opening windows is the easiest way to reduce formaldehyde concentrations in homes. The best option is to use only building products that emit little or no formaldehyde. However, when conventional building materials are already in place and emitting formaldehyde, the problem will remedy itself with time. Materials that are several years old emit far less formaldehyde than new products.

The Wilson family moved into a new home last summer. Within days, they were feeling ill. Their eyes were burning, they had sore throats, and they were chronically tired.

Cleaning products and air fresheners can produce formaldehyde. UC Berkeley researchers found that chemicals in pine oils and citrus oils react with ozone in the air, producing formaldehyde. Formaldehyde is a strong eye, nose, throat, and lung irritant. Formaldehyde is also an asthma trigger and a carcinogen, according to the EPA.

How can air quality in the home have more pollution than outside the home? Discover the three elements which contirbute most to indoor air pollution in your home.

Is your home healthy?  Residents in Calgary, Alberta, are getting answers to that question from the Healthy Homes Calgary program offered by Clean Calgary Association.

The new residential service provides free home visits to Calgarians who are interested in “creating a healthy living environment, while reducing the home’s eco-footprint.”  A staff member or trained volunteer shares tools and information city residents need to improve indoor air quality, energy and water efficiency, waste reduction and more.

Sharon and her family felt ill. They were coughing and wheezing. Their eyes were watery and red. They had headaches and rashes on their skin.
Sharon contacted an industrial hygienist about their problems. Just a few questions led to the culprit. Formaldehyde can cause precisely the symptoms Sharon and her family experienced. Formaldehyde is also a carcinogen.

Cathy Woods’ new granite counters were radioactive. They contained as much uranium as commercial uranium ore. The showroom that sold Cathy her Jupurana Bordeaux granite did not warn her that some granite is radioactive. When I contacted the salesman, posing as a customer, he assured me their granite “is no more radioactive than soil or water”. However, Cathy’s granite emitted gamma radiation at many times background. The radon gas emitted by the stone tripled the radon concentration in her kitchen. [...]

While autism rates have been climbing at a frightening rate, its root causes have remained elusive.  Researchers at the University of California, Davis M.I.N.D. institute have concluded that the focus of autism research should shift away from genetics or accounting practices and toward the increase of toxic chemicals and infectious microbes in the environment, especially in the home. Since 1990, autism rates in California have increased 600 to 700 percent. The study, published in Epidemiology, suggests that environmental toxins like metals, pesticides, and infectious agents could play a large part in the increase.

The dramatic increase in autism rates in California has been attributed to several factors, including increases in families bringing autistic children into California and changes in how autistic children are diagnosed.  To address the first issue, the study only looked at California natives. The second issue, accounting practices, played a small part in the increase, but no more than 20% of the overall increase.

Emissions and Indoor Air Quality

While sustainability and energy efficiency often dominate the green building conversation, the issue that can have the most immediate impact on your family’s health is indoor air quality.  Green building programs seek to limit your family’s exposure to Volatile Organic Compounds, or VOCs, that exist in some building materials and furniture.  Continued exposure to these VOCs has caused health problems ranging from headaches and nausea to cancer.  Green building programs like the US Green Building Council’s LEED for Homes and LEED for New Construction encourage builders to eliminate these emissions whenever possible.

If building green comes at a slightly higher cost it is because many of these harmful chemicals are so widespread that finding products without them can be a challenge.  In fact, it is the presence of these chemicals in some products that makes them cheaper, as in wood products containing urea-formaldehyde.

Those looking to improve the indoor air quality of their current house can make several changes that will significantly reduce VOCs.

Some sources of harmful emissions in the home:

This post is a follow-up to The Fight Over Radon in Granite Countertops Heats Up, which will provide some background information on the granite/radon issue.

With the legion of both deniers and alarmists out there attempting to monopolize the discussion over the safety of granite countertops, it is difficult to find unbiased information.  Peruse the comments in the above post and you can see the discussion has devolved into name calling.  The deniers, many of whom work in the granite industry, blast any insinuation that granite could be dangerous as “fear-mongering” and put down the current research as “junk science.”  The alarmists, many of whom sell competing countertops, argue that consumers shouldn’t take the risk that comes with granite.  The truth, as with most heated arguments, can be found somewhere in the middle.

Please visit an updated post on radon in granite countertops here:  A Rational Discussion on Radon in Granite Countertops

The Marble Institute of America better get ready for another round of fighting because the issue of radon in granite countertops is back. For the past decade, the MIA has been trying, with much success, to squash the rumor that granite countertops have the potential to add dangerous amounts of radon in the home. A new study being conducted by Houston area not-for-profit BuildClean is raising old fears about the dangers of granite countertops, and its preliminary results show that while most granite countertops in the study contain very little to no radon at all, the countertops that do contain radon have levels that are frighteningly high. While consumers can be secure in the fact that the vast majority of granite is perfectly safe, a small percentage is still in question, and no independent scientific study exists to assuage consumer fears.

The first issue of Solid Surface in 1995 explored the possibility that granite countertops may pose a health risk. Soon, the MIA issued their response, which attacked the credibility of the science involved in the study as well as the fact that the advertisers in the journal included companies that competed with granite countertop manufacturers. But one phrase in the response, a highlighted phrase no less, is troubling: “…actual levels of radon gas emmissions are so low as to be insignificant and generally represent no threat.” As a father, I don’t want to be assured that there is “generally” no threat to my family. I want to know there is no threat. And after BuildClean* found that 3 of 95 granite countertops contained harmful amounts of radon, would the MIA consider such a small number to be “generally” no threat? I’m sure the owners of those three countertops are not reassured.