I used to live by a busy street in a semi-dense part of town. Cars would be going around 45mph.
When I moved from that apartment after 4 years. I was shocked by the amount of black dust covering everything. from the walls to the shelves and floors. I think it was all tire pollution so switching to 100% electric won't mitigate.
It was pretty shocking and I wondered how much i increased my risk for lung cancer or other cancers.
Man, similar story. Spent a few months next to a mall parking lot with rough asphalt. Apparently the neighborhood had a car drifting crowd, and they'd regularly do so, which made me irrationally angry.
I only realized later that all the black dust everywhere must have been tire particles, when I realized other places DON'T have the black dust. Given the toxicity of tire pollution, it doesn't seem like my reaction was irrational after all. Sucks for all the people that still live there, who may not even realize what's going on.
I was just talking to my wife about playgrounds using shredded tires as the "mulch". I don't know where the rubber comes from, if and how it is cleaned, or what particulate material it carries, but it seems dubious at best.
It's banned for new installs in Europe and existing installations have to be replaced by 2031 [1] - although primarily to get rid of a microplastics emission source. Additionally, shredded tire rubber as infill is investigated for being contaminated with PAH (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) [2].
Personally, I more suspect vehicles. We got a grip on particulate emissions from diesel engines, but brakes and tires still emit fine dust particles. The average one way commute is 30 minutes in the US, so you're breathing in pretty filthy air for an hour a day...
This would be 'pretty easy' to demonstrate by comparing cancer rates by people who live adjacent to busy highways against those who live in rural areas. 'Pretty easy' is always nonsense in observational studies because the confounders have confounders that are confounded by other confounders; even more so for things that are relatively poorly understood, like cancer. But it's at least something that would certainly get (and probably already has been?) funded.
We got at least a link between heavy road traffic and stunted lung growth in children, as well as at least 10% increased lung cancer rates [1]. Additionally, noise from road traffic has been linked to increased rates of cardiovascular disease and mental health issues [2].
Both of this is compounded by the fact that people living next to major roads tend to be poorer, so there is a socio-economic issue present as well.
Hopefully not. I keep the windows up and recycle the air (which should be filtered on its way in anyway). I live a bit closer to road than I'd like considering the traffic levels though so even keeping windows open in the house could be an issue.
6PPD (N-(1,3-dimethylbutyl)-N′-phenyl-p-phenylenediamine)
•Purpose: Antioxidant to prevent rubber cracking.
•Danger: When it reacts with ozone and air, it forms 6PPD-quinone, a toxic compound shown to kill salmon and other aquatic life at trace levels.
•Status: Under increasing regulatory scrutiny (e.g., Washington State has started restricting it).
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2. Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs)
•Purpose: Byproducts from extender oils and carbon black.
•Danger: Known carcinogens, mutagens, and endocrine disruptors. Persist in the environment and can leach from tire wear particles.
•Status: Regulated in the EU; linked to air and soil contamination.
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3. Benzothiazoles (e.g., 2-mercaptobenzothiazole)
•Purpose: Vulcanization accelerators.
•Danger: Toxic to aquatic organisms, possibly carcinogenic, and bioaccumulative.
•Status: Found in tire leachate and considered a contaminant of emerging concern.
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Nothing definitive about harm to human welfare yet, as far as I know.
"When tires wear on pavement, 6PPD is released. It reacts with ozone to become a different chemical, 6PPD-q, which can be extremely toxic — so much so that it has been linked to repeated fish kills in Washington state.... Testing by a British company, Emissions Analytics, found that a car's tires emit 1 trillion ultrafine particles per kilometer driven — from 5 to 9 pounds of rubber per internal combustion car per year....
a team of researchers, led by scientists at Washington State University and the University of Washington, who were trying to determine why coho salmon returning to Seattle-area creeks to spawn were dying in large numbers.... in 2020 they announced they'd found the culprit: 6PPD....
Tests by Emissions Analytics have found that tires produce up to 2,000 times as much particle pollution by mass as tailpipes."
My (wealthy) high school had a "turf" field which uses little rubber pellets as the "dirt". Those were probably shredded tires too. During football season you would see them tracked around the school, and if you were a football player or in the band they would show up at your house.
also, they would periodocially dump "more dirt" onto the field, once every year or so. Not sure if they vacuumed the old stuff up or just dumped more on top, but sometimes you would go out there and there would be a huge pile of rubber in the middle, which I guess got spread out later
Where I live during the Rugby and Soccer seasons it's not uncommon for the 'normal' pitches to be unplayable due to consistent periods of rain.
A number of schools, and public facilities, near me have switched to plastic pitches for this reason. I'm not advocating for them but there is a rationale.
BTW it's not just that being very muddy makes it difficult to play on but that using the pitch in that state trashes the grass.
The lungs are exposed to air, but they're also exposed to a lot of bloodborne compounds, since a full vascular cycle goes through the pulmonary arteries.
The null hypothesis is "it's something in the air", but with the increase in non-lung cancers in young people[1] noted over the past decade, it's entirely possible it's something else, and lung tissue is one of the susceptible ones to whatever it is.
This might actually be brake dust. In that case, the situation most likely will be improved by electric cars because they use their brakes far less often, decelerating with their motors.
Breaks are only part of the problem unfortunately.
> Resuspension of dust already on the road’s surface is the most significant contributor to non-exhaust PM by far, however these particles are difficult to characterize and manage because they could come from anywhere before landing on the road. Brakes are the next most significant source, and may also be particularly hazardous because of their small size and high metal content. Tires contribute the least, but they release large amounts of particles which act as microplastics in ecosystems.
I've heard that regenerative braking helps, but the relatively higher mass of an electric car (because of the battery) hurts. I wonder how it adds up in terms of brake dust produced.
My EV is around 25 % heavier than comparable ICE vehicles, but it only uses the disc brakes to stop the car from walking pace and hold it in place. I wouldn't be surprised if the amount of brake dust was less than 5 % of what my previous car emitted.
But then you have much more tire dust, since it rises rather exponentially and not linearly with mass of the vehicle. Overall more health-friendly but not as much as people(owners) like to think.
And it could be both tire dust and or brake dust are indicators of proximity to combustion engine exhaust. Any individual or combination of those could be an increased cancer risk. But only the dust is immediately visible and leaves behind a tangible trace
Yeah there's a lot of stuff comes off tyres, and EVs still have that. They also produce brake dust, although maybe less of it because of regenerative braking.
But they do have no tailpipe emissions, so they're still kicking out a lot less air pollution than a combustion-fuelled vehicle with not just the carbon dioxide but the myriad of pollutants which lower urban air quality so much.
Ultimately, a less dusty tyre would be a good thing, but the significant impact we can make now is to continue the EV transition knowing that like all solutions it's imperfect and we also need to use fewer vehicles and keep looking for better options.
I don't doubt a significant portion was tire and brake dust, but even gasoline and diesel can emit a significant amount of soot and unburned hydrocarbons.
When I moved from that apartment after 4 years. I was shocked by the amount of black dust covering everything. from the walls to the shelves and floors. I think it was all tire pollution so switching to 100% electric won't mitigate.
It was pretty shocking and I wondered how much i increased my risk for lung cancer or other cancers.