WHO Declares Diesel Fumes Cause Lung Cancer - and those idling DMU sets

Run_to_da_hills

Time to knock off all those long term idling DMU sets in enclosed station enviornments.

"Diesel fumes cause lung cancer, the World Health Organization declared Tuesday, and experts said they were more carcinogenic than secondhand cigarette smoke".

It wasn't too long ago when I saw rail staff order a commuter to stub out a fag at Pearse st Station when at the same time there was a stationary 29000 idling across the tracks.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/13/health/diesel-fumes-cause-lung-cancer-who-says.html

the groutch

the W.H.O. are in the pocket of the tobacco giants, they get paid to blame everything except smoking.

n97 mini

World+dog have known for decades that diesel fumes cause lung cancer. It's good to finally get the WHO to admit it.

Green Diesel

Run_to_da_hills wrote: »

It wasn't too long ago when I saw rail staff order a commuter to stub out a fag at Pearse st Station when at the same time there was a stationary 29000 idling across the tracks.

Yeah, but doesn't everyone love the smell of diesel. :cool:

Carawaystick

Green Diesel wrote: »

Yeah, but doesn't everyone love the smell of diesel. :cool:

Diesel sometimes, diesel smoke- never

Victor

Original press release: http://press.iarc.fr/pr213_E.pdf

Run_to_da_hills wrote: »

It wasn't too long ago when I saw rail staff order a commuter to stub out a fag at Pearse st Station when at the same time there was a stationary 29000 idling across the tracks.

Well, smoking is illegal in station buildings.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/whos-cancer-agency-reclassifies-diesel-fumes-as-carcinogenic-same-as-arsenic-uv-rays/2012/06/12/gJQA9pTeXV_story.html

“It’s on the same order of magnitude as passive smoking,” said Kurt Straif, director of the IARC department that evaluates cancer risks. ...

The new classification followed a weeklong discussion in Lyon, France, by an expert panel organized by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. The panel’s decision stands as the ruling for the IARC, the cancer arm of the World Health Organization.

The particular concern seems to apply to people who are exposed to higher concentrations of such fumes in confined spaces, like miners.

Note that almost anything that is burned (fuels, tobacco, cannabis) could cause cancer - the ash and tar that is produced can contain all sorts of nasty chemicals, in particular benzene. So be wary of overdoing the sausages and burgers this weekend. However, just because you can't see it doesn't mean it is safe - the smaller, less obvious particles can penetrate further into the lungs than the larger sooty ones.

CIE

Run_to_da_hills wrote: »

Time to knock off all those long term idling DMU sets in enclosed station enviornments.

Diesel fumes cause lung cancer, the World Health Organization declared Tuesday, and experts said they were more carcinogenic than secondhand cigarette smoke.

It wasn't too long ago when I saw rail staff order a commuter to stub out a fag at Pearse st Station when at the same time there was a stationary 29000 idling across the tracks.

New York Times

Anything related to the UN is a joke. They trying to get Ireland to further indebt itself by electrifying all the railways and convert all of the city bus networks to trolleybuses or back to tram? How about long-distance buses? It'd be a bit difficult to have long-distance trolleybuses run down the motorway, I think...

Funny how they don't specify what kind of "diesel fuel", although I'm quite sure that they mean petroleum distillates. Diesel engines are quite flexible as to what kind of fuel they are capable of burning. Rudolf Diesel himself originally designed the engine to operate on pulverised coal; the engines he displayed in Paris ran on peanut oil.

charlemont

CIE wrote: »

Anything related to the UN is a joke. They trying to get Ireland to further indebt itself by electrifying all the railways and convert all of the city bus networks to trolleybuses or back to tram? How about long-distance buses? It'd be a bit difficult to have long-distance trolleybuses run down the motorway, I think...

Funny how they don't specify what kind of "diesel fuel", although I'm quite sure that they mean petroleum distillates. Diesel engines are quite flexible as to what kind of fuel they are capable of burning. Rudolf Diesel himself originally designed the engine to operate on pulverised coal; the engines he displayed in Paris ran on peanut oil.

I'm sure Rudolf Diesel's original engine was to run on hemp oil.

CIE

charlemont wrote: »

I'm sure Rudolf Diesel's original engine was to run on hemp oil

I can't seem to find any record of that. Hempseed oil has been looked into more recently as biodiesel, and as far as cetane number goes, it appears to be in the low 40s.

corktina

I doubt Diesel Oil was available before he invented his engine:rolleyes:, so I'd believe that.

monument

the groutch wrote: »

the W.H.O. are in the pocket of the tobacco giants, they get paid to blame everything except smoking.

Funny, because a quick Google of Who and smoking finds: "Smoking at an early age increases the risk of lung cancer. For most smoking-related cancers, the risk rises as the individual continues to smoke" etc

I'm not saying Who are perfect, nor am I saying that they can't be influenced by business interests or other who don't know what they are talking about. But to try to claim that they are trying to blame everything expect smoking is nonsense.

Just because smoking is a leading cause of cancer, it does not mean there are not other environmental causes. The ill effects of motor vehicle particles on humans and of emissions on the world is well documented. But hey like all of our other problems (like the housing boom) -- best to just put our head in the sand!

CIE wrote: »

Anything related to the UN is a joke. They trying to get Ireland to further indebt itself by electrifying all the railways and convert all of the city bus networks to trolleybuses or back to tram? How about long-distance buses? It'd be a bit difficult to have long-distance trolleybuses run down the motorway, I think...

Where did you see the UN prescribing those things for Ireland?

Run_to_da_hills made the rail link, but the reality is cars with mostly one person in them going short distances in urban areas is a large part of the main problem. Intercity trains, buses etc which are mostly out in the county are likely a tiny part of the problem, or at least when they are out in the county is not the problem. There are also solutions to keep large trucks out of urban areas and a range of means for the 'last mile'.

Even if you were to look at urban buses, there's a host of options to reduce or remove the problem: including part or full electric buses (which make a lot more sense than putting resources into electric cars as we are doing now!). These options would also have energy/cost saving benefits, and less greenhouse emissions, and other positives such as less noise (anybody who has lived beside a bus route will know what I'm talking about).

CIE

monument wrote: »

Where did you see the UN prescribing those things for Ireland?

Via the European Union. This statement is out of the preamble of the Treaty of Lisbon (TFEU section):

INTENDING to confirm the solidarity which binds Europe and the overseas countries and desiring to ensure the development of their prosperity, in accordance with the principles of the Charter of the United Nations …

...and the UN is mentioned several times more in the Treaty of Lisbon than that.

Even if you were to look at urban buses, there's a host of options to reduce or remove the problem: including part or full electric buses (which make a lot more sense than putting resources into electric cars as we are doing now!) These options would also have energy/cost saving benefits, and less greenhouse emissions, and other positives such as less noise (anybody who has lived beside a bus route will know what I'm talking about)

I would prefer trolleybus infrastructure due to the permanence. It would mean less moving parts on the actual buses (no excessive battery arrays that could discharge at almost no notice) and far less impetus to institute confusing radical route changes.

Run_to_da_hills

CIE wrote: »

Anything related to the UN is a joke. They trying to get Ireland to further indebt itself by electrifying all the railways and convert all of the city bus networks to trolleybuses or back to tram? How about long-distance buses? It'd be a bit difficult to have long-distance trolleybuses run down the motorway, I think...

Funny how they don't specify what kind of "diesel fuel", although I'm quite sure that they mean petroleum distillates. Diesel engines are quite flexible as to what kind of fuel they are capable of burning. Rudolf Diesel himself originally designed the engine to operate on pulverised coal; the engines he displayed in Paris ran on peanut oil.

I would agree with you on that one, I don't want to drag this into CT but there seems to be a globalist governance agenda behind all these multi national environment umbrella organisations. Creating legislation that would lead a country further in debt so it would need more bailouts from the banking cabals would be one way of achieving this.

Also a major roll out of electric powered infrastructure would involve nuke energy to bring the emission levels down, I don't think this country would go down that road after Fukushima.

Judgement Day

Time was - and not that long ago - when locos had to be shut down after arrival in enclosed terminals such as Connolly and Heuston but expediency now rules and the DMUs are allowed to bellow away, wasting fuel and polluting the atmosphere.

end of the road

Judgement Day wrote: »

the DMUs are allowed to bellow away, wasting fuel and polluting the atmosphere.

yeh, and its probably done so to bump up the cost of running services.
back when a 29 k did the run to rosslare on the afternoon service it was shut off at connolly until near the time to go. the engines were but not the generators. mind you the 2700s would have been prime candidates to be shut off altogether in every station as when some of them are stopped they have a little problem with fumes leaking in to the carrige. whenever i was on a 2700 i have had to open the window the minute it stopped. seems to be fine once it takes off though.

foggy_lad

The set-up of the new DMU's should be changed so that the engines shut down after maybe 5 minutes of idling and when in Connolly/Heuston etc awaiting departure. I am sure this could be done quite easily but is there any corporate will to save some € when it does not involve reducing staff numbers?

n97 mini

A couple of years ago I emailed IE and the minister about trains idling in Connolly after I nearly developed tumours from fumes of the 17:15 to Longford, idling away on platform 4 at 16:45, asking them was it necessary.

Neither had the courtesy to reply.

dowlingm

Oh for chrissakes give over. If this was the days of the EMD567s etc I'd say something - even if we still saw a good bit of 071 passenger haulage. The DMU engines are what, Euro IIIA or something? They probably put out in a day what a 181 put out in 10 minutes in respect of PM10, SOx, NOx etc.

Judgement Day

If they had replied it would have been buck passing by the minister (operational matter for IE) and by IE it would have been evasive and nothing would have changed. The air in Connolly can be quite toxic at times - and that's even at the Loop line platforms which are open to the air.

end of the road

if their not going anywhere for ages they should be turned off, end of.

n97 mini

dowlingm wrote: »

The DMU engines are what, Euro IIIA or something?

Have you actually looked at what's permitted for this kind of vehicle, and compared it to equivalent petrol car standards? The standards for diesels are shockingly poor.

dowlingm

IE went mad in the Rotem shop and bought "commuter" DMUs which are really only useful on the Kildare line. Ramming Maynooth electrification into the Interconnector project will I think prove to be a grave mistake by IE, when they could have been running Gorey-Greystones (lift panto)-Connolly-Maynooth (down panto)-Mullingar trains by now, with a cleaner Connolly airshed than even eliminating idling and getting the 710ECO mods for the 201s would have done. It's not like nobody makes a 1500VDC/diesel hybrid...