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Mutagenicity- and Pollutant-Emission Factors ofSolid-Fuel Cookstoves: Comparison to OtherCombustion Sources
Citation:
Mutlu, E., S. Warren, S. Ebersviller, I. Kooter, Judy Schmid, J. Dye, Bill Linak, Ian Gilmour, Jim Jetter, M. Higuchi, AND D. DeMarini. Mutagenicity- and Pollutant-Emission Factors ofSolid-Fuel Cookstoves: Comparison to OtherCombustion Sources. ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), Research Triangle Park, NC, 124:974-982, (2016).
Impact/Purpose:
To be submitted to the "Environmental Health Perspective"
Description:
Acknowledgments Funding for this research was provided by the intramural research program of the Office of Research and Development of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Research Triangle Park, NC. The authors declare that they have no actual or potential competing financial interests.We thank Andrew D. Kligerman for statistical help and both he and Jeffrey A. Ross for their helpful comments on this manuscript, H. de Weerd and H. Makarem for their help with the PAH and levoglucosan analyses, Bill Preston and Michael Hays for the organic carbon/elemental carbon (OC/EC) measurements, and Todd Krantz and Charly King for collecting the emissions. This article was reviewed by the National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and approved for publication. Approval does not signify that the contents reflect the views of the agency nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute endorsement or recommendation for use.AbstractBACKGROUND: Emissions from solid fuels used for cooking cause ~4 million premature deaths per year. Advanced solid-fuel cookstoves are a potential solution, but such stoves should be assessed by appropriate performance indicators, including health effects.OBJECTIVE: We evaluated two categories of biomass cookstoves for 10 pollutant- and a set of mutagenicity-emission factors, correlated them, and compared the mutagenicity-emission factor to those of combustion emissions with known human-health effects. METHODS: We burned red oak in a 3-stone fire (TSF), a natural-draft stove (NDS), and a forced-draft stove (FDS); we combusted propane as a liquid/gas control fuel. We determined emission factors based on useful energy (megajoules delivered, MJd) for carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides (NOx), black carbon, methane, total hydrocarbons, 32 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, PM2.5, levoglucosan (a wood-smoke marker), and mutagenicity in Salmonella. RESULTS: Other than NOx all of the emission factors per MJd (a) related to incomplete combustion, (b) correlated highly among each other, and (c) were reduced on average 68 or 92% by the NDS or FDS, respectively, relative to the TSF. Nonetheless, the mutagenicity-emission factor based on fuel energy (MJthermal) for the best stove (FDS) was similar to that of diesel exhaust, a human carcinogen. CONCLUSIONS: Mutagenicity- and many pollutant-emission factors are equally informative for characterizing cookstove performance; however, health-effects emission factors are essential for characterizing the health safety of cookstoves. An FDS operated as intended by the manufacturer is safer than a TSF, but it is not safe to the primary user without adequate ventilation.
