Factors Impacting Range Hood Use in California Houses and Low-Income Apartments.

Haoran Zhao,Brett C. Singer,Wanyu R. Chan,Iain S. Walker,William W. Delp,Hao Tang

doi:10.3390/ijerph17238870

Abstract

Venting range hoods can control indoor air pollutants emitted during residential cooktop and oven cooking. To quantify their potential benefits, it is important to know how frequently and under what conditions range hoods are operated during cooking. We analyzed data from 54 single family houses and 17 low-income apartments in California in which cooking activities, range hood use, and fine particulate matter (PM2.5) were monitored for one week per home. Range hoods were used for 36% of cooking events in houses and 28% in apartments. The frequency of hood use increased with cooking frequency across homes. In both houses and apartments, the likelihood of hood use during a cooking event increased with the duration of cooktop burner use, but not with the duration of oven use. Actual hood use rates were higher in the homes of participants who self-reported more frequent use in a pre-study survey, but actual use was far lower than self-reported frequency. Residents in single family houses used range hoods more often when cooking caused a discernible increase in PM2.5. In apartments, residents used their range hood more often only when high concentrations of PM2.5 were generated during cooking.

Highlights

Cooking is one of the largest sources of air pollutant emissions inside many homes
NO2 from gas cooking burners may commonly result in indoor concentrations that exceed the threshold of 100 ppb over 1 h that is used in the U.S ambient air quality standard [8,9]
We investigated range hood use for 784 cooking events in 71 homes including 54 single family houses and 17 low-income apartments constructed or renovated in recent years

Summary

Introduction

Cooking is one of the largest sources of air pollutant emissions inside many homes. Gas cooking burners emit carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2 ), formaldehyde (HCHO) and ultrafine particles and electric burners emit ultrafine particles in substantial quantities [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]. NO2 from gas cooking burners may commonly result in indoor concentrations that exceed the threshold of 100 ppb over 1 h that is used in the U.S ambient air quality standard [8,9]. Belanger et al [10] reported that exposure to higher levels of residential NO2 was associated with asthma severity and a meta-review by Lin et al [11] found that gas cooking and higher NO2 exposure were each associated with increased risk of asthma and higher NO2 was associated with current wheeze. In addition to the health effects associated with higher exposures to these pollutants (e.g., [21]), a study in Hong Kong [22]

Methods

Results

Conclusion