Indoor Plants as Air Filters

Last week we looked at the importance of fresh air and its ability to have an impact on,

Asthma,
Pneumonia,
Fatige,
Diabetes, and even
Heart Disease.

We also looked at how we can bring fresh air indoors through

Reducing and removing,
Ventilating,
Natural infiltration, and
Cleaning.

One way in which we can clean the air is through using plants.

In the late 80s, NASA looked at how plants can be used to clean air in enclosed spaces that would be involved in space inhibition

The research still seems to be a bit mixed, though.

The NASA experiment involved the us of carbon filters, too and further tests have mad mixed results.

It is thought that this may be a matter of the amount of plants vs the amount of space.

Still it is proposed that it is in sealed, non-ventilated spaces that are most effective at removing air pollution.

Coulthard lists the top 10 air cleaners as:

Areca palm,
Lady palm,
Bamboo palm,
Rubber plant,
Dracaena,
English ivy,
Dwarf date palm,
Fig trees,
Boston fern, and
Peace lily.

Conclusion

While the research results are mixed, in enclosed environments, it is thought that plants can help us to naturally filter and clean chemical from the air. Here are a list of the top 10 air cleaning plants.

Wolverton, B. C., Johnson, A., & Bounds, K. (1989). Interior landscape plants for indoor air pollution abatement.

For those of us who live in the country, fresh air might just be outside, but what if you live in a city?

Most of us have seen those images on TV of large cities being choked by smog.

Photo by VichienPetchmai/iStock / Getty Images

So which is worse?

Coulthard cites research from the Royal College of Physicians that says that pollutants indoors can be up to 100x worse than outdoors. This is pretty bad considering we spend most of our time indoors, these days.

How do we bring fresh air indoors?

Reduce and Remove

The first step is to stop polluting the air indoors. There is not use cleaning the air if things in our homes are still releasing toxins.

Coulthard suggests we do this by minimising thigns that release chemical vapours such as:

Chemical air freshners,
Strong chemical cleaning products,
Hairsprays,
High volatile organic compound (VOC) paints, lacquers and varnishes,
Plywood and MDF (due to high formaldehyde),
Gas,
Parrafin, and
Coal.

Photo by skynesher/iStock / Getty Images

Ventilate

Once we reuce and remove, we can work on getting more fresh air in.

Coulthard outlines three ways of doing this.

Natural Ventilation

This involves opening
Doors,
Window, and
Skylights.

Photo by Blair_witch/iStock / Getty Images

Mechanical Ventilation

This involve the use of systems such as
In-built ventilation systems, and
Extraction fans.

Natural Infiltration

We often don’t think about it but our homes have lots of tiny little gaps where air naturally comes in. This includes

Gaps,
Chimney flues, and
Cracks.

Photo by richard johnson/iStock / Getty Images

Clean

The third, and last, method is to clean the air.

Coulthard suggests 5 ways for us to do this

1. Find out what is causing the problem.

a. Air quality testing kits might help.

2. Get a vacuum cleaner with a HEPA filter.

3. Vacuum regularly or switch to hard floors.

4. Use air filtering plants (more on this another time).

5. Consider an air purifier or filter.

a. These vary in how effective they are but Coulthard suggests we look for 4 things.

i. A good quality HEPA filter.

ii. An activated carbon filter (which removes traffic gases)

iii. The room size it is recommended for.

iv. How many air exchanges it can do every hour.

Conclusion

Air quality has a big impact on our health. Indoor health quality can be improved by removing sources of pollutants from indoors, mechanical ventilation, natural infiltration and cleaning our indoor air. Next week we will look how plants can help us to that.

Using Plants to Clean Our Air

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