Materials > Urban Pollution

Urban benzene and population exposure

People aren't just at risk from carcinogenic benzene when they are out on city streets: sadly, the air is polluted also inside of buildings. Scientific research has demonstrated that, among all the materials for inside walls and floors, technical ceramics are the least pollution-prone.

To explain these findings, we suggest that pollution indoors is caused by benzene entering from the streets outside, as shown by the good fit of respective seasonal trends (data  not shown).
The pollution indoors is generally higher than outdoors, possibly because of an imbalance between the flow of pollutant from outside and its removal from inside to outside. In other words , the house itself could be acting as a fly flywheel created by absorbent surfaces on walls, floors and furnishings.
This idea is supported by the lower indoor pollution in southern European towns: in northern European houses, carpets, linoleum and wood surfaces are favoured, whereas tiling, marble and bare walls are typically used in southern Europe.
Urban benzene and population exposure, Fondazione Salvatore Maugeri-IRCCS, Padova, Italy, 2000)

Download the research, published on Nature magazine (Volume 404, page 141) (.pdf)

The research, published on Nature magazine (Volume 404, page 141), features an international panel of scientific researchers:

• V. Cocheo, P. Sacco, C. Boaretto
  Fondazione Salvatore Maugeri-IRCCS (Italy)
• E. De Saeger, P. Perez Ballesta
  Joint Research Centre Ispra (Italy)
• H. Skov
  National Environmental Research Institute (Denmark)
• E. Goelen
  Vlaamse Instelling voor Technologisch Onderzoek (Belgium)
• N. Gonzalez
  Institut National de l'Environnement Industriel et de Risques (France)
• A. Baeza Caracena
  Universidad de Murcia - Dep. de Ingenieria Quimica (Spain)