INGENIOUS

Context

UK residents spend around 90% of their time indoors, yet regulations to address air pollution focus almost solely on outdoor exposure. Indoor air pollution takes many forms, from particulate matter such as dust and soot from wood burners to gases like carbon monoxide from gas stoves. Breathing in these particles and gases are bad for our health and poor indoor air quality has been linked to lung diseases including asthma, cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Many of the activities we do in our own homes produce airborne pollutants, including particles and chemicals that can be harmful to our health. We don’t know exactly where all of these pollutants come from, how they interact with each other or where they end up.

Aims and Objectives

INGENIOUS aims help us better understand how the composition and concentration of indoor air pollutants vary and how this exposure affects people in their homes. It will investigate these unknowns and deliver useful interventions to limit exposure. 

The project will focus on homes in the city of Bradford, which, like many other parts of the UK, is affected by poor air quality. Bradford has a multi-ethnic population and high levels of deprivation, with some of the highest childhood illness rates in the UK.

The team will quantify and identify: 

• the composition and concentrations of air pollutants within indoor spaces, such as those from cooking and cleaning
• how air pollutants react chemically and transform over time, including when different air pollutants mix
• how air pollutants from indoor air sources affect outdoor air quality and vice versa
• how different household behaviours affect the production of and exposure to air pollutants and how this affects health outcomes and inequalities
• which behaviour change interventions are most effective at reducing exposure to indoor air pollution
• which recommendations to take forward as policy solutions