Talk:Diesel exhaust

Remedies?

 * It would be nice to see a section in here about (if there are any) remedies to diesel exhaust, such as filters or catalytic converters... 16:10, 20 November 2006 User:68.175.108.132
 * I have added a section. Biscuittin (talk) 10:17, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Composition

 * some average percent compositions of these substances would be beneficial 06:18, 1 November 2009 User:98.243.187.158

Global warming potential of DPM
I am interested to know about the global warming potential of DPM. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 206.170.183.60 (talk) 22:46, 27 April 2007 (UTC).

Diesel particulates in Europe
Until the past few years, with the advent of better diesel engines and filters, Western Europe has been blanketed in a high concentration of diesel particulates. The entire continent literally reeked of diesel fumes. Yet lifespans were longer than in North America. Is there any epidemiological evidence for the harmful effects of moderate levels of diesel particulates? 10:58, 3 August 2007 User:72.49.143.224

Environmentalist POV?
I think it's beyond dispute that DPM is generally bad for your health, but it seems to me that instead of an encyclopedic article, this page (which was split from the article on automobile exhaust not too long ago) is all about telling you how horrid DPM is. Barely two sentences is dedicated to describing WHAT it is, non-sensationalist studies about the health impact of DPM is not discussed, negative side effects of efforts to combat DPM (higher fuel prices, more complex equipment and maintenance, even higher fuel consumption in many cases) are given nary a mention.

I will admit to some bias in the other direction, and for that reason I don't think I'm the best choice to revise the article. However, I'll tag it for POV review, and hopefully more experienced Wikipedians will come along and help contribute to a more balanced POV and some more scientific facts. Stian Oksavik 18:09, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I have to say that it seems pretty neutral to me. After all DPM is a known carcinogen so describing how horrid it is seems appropriate. Compare this article to articles on other airborne carcinogens such as Hexavalent chromium. I agree however, that a more structured and analytic approach to the toxicology would be useful, especially with more references to the scientific literature. I might try to get to this in the next couple of weeks. Grhabyt (talk) 01:56, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

This article is in no way neutral, you CAN NOT selectively comment about negative effects unless the title is along the lines of "negative effects of diesel particulate matter", —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.38.101.11 (talk) 01:59, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree the article is biased, for the reasons stated above, but also because it unfairly makes diesel sound so much worse than exhaust from other engines. They all have their bad parts. Most of the "studies" done suggesting ill effects are impossible to prove as one is simply not allowed to lock a human being in a room an make him breath diesel exhaust for ten years to find out whether he has got cancer. Diesel exhaust causes autism? Seriously? People do realize that most of these "studies" are done by people with an axe to grind, a lawsuit to win, or a new book to sell. Many "scientists" only too willing to make some good scary thing up to sell books, or to back up a multi-million dollar lawsuit as a paid expert witness. I doubt diesel is very good for you, but I don't think it's anywhere near as terrible as this makes it sound. Many, many people breath diesel exhaust all the time and never show any obvious ill effect from it. It's like people who treat lead paint as if it was radioactive waste, and will cause you to keel over dead. Ridiculous. My father has had chronic lead poisoning for 50 years, and it hasn't done more than make his pretty sore sometimes. I imagine that list of "terrible things" in diesel exhaust is relatively accurate, but I'd like to see the actual AMOUNTS of each of these substances that they found, in parts per billion, along with the equivalent for a typical gasoline engine running on unleaded. I guarantee most of those "toxic substances" are found in incredibly minute amounts well below what you will be exposed to by numerous other sources, and well below what your body can naturally deal with on its own, provided you aren't weak and ready to die to start with. For example, diesel exhaust contains "metal erosion particulates" (I believe it said). The only place those could come from is the amazing small amount of metal that is worn off and blown out with the exhaust as the engine runs. We're talking minute amounts, or there is no way truck engines could routinely run to 1,000,000miles and over on the original engine. Also, there is absolutely no reason you wouldn't find these same metal particles in the exhaust of ANY ICE engine, gasoline or diesel. But the fact remains that the amounts are phenomenally small, and lists like this reek of scare tactics to scare people who don't know anything about engines and who are scared when they read about terrible things like "calcium chloride" in their foods.

I'd also like to point out that miners work in an environment full of dust from drilling and blasting rock. Miners have always been succeptable to lung problems, since long before there were diesel engines. How did it go from the assumption being that rock dust caused these issues to diesel exhaust being the problem? Railroad locomotive operators? Have you ever noticed how the ballast around the rails, and the wheels and suspension of rail equipment always seems to take on a rusty tone eventually (note the photograph of the locomotive on top of the page)? That rusty color is caused by the wheels and tracks continuously wearing each other down as the trains roll over them, spreading metal dust all over the place, which then rusts and turns the rock ballast and underside of the train rusty colored. What's to say that this metal dust doesn't have some effect on locomotive crewmen? Is there significant statistical evidence that crew on diesel trains are clearly subject to much worse health issues than those on electric trains? How about the tar they use to preserve the wooden ties (sleepers) in the US? It's way too easy to lie with statistics, and thus for an article like this, which relies mainly on "evidence" take from statistical "studies" (with inherently poor controls, as are all long term retroactive human health studies, especially those with potential financial incentive for those being interviewed to make things seem bad) I think that there should be more focus on HOW these statistics were developed, how they relate to each other and the statistics for other fuels and engine types, and just how serious these substances are in the amounts they've discovered as related to the acceptable levels allowed by law..45Colt 23:58, 7 August 2015 (UTC)
 * That red stuff on trains is almost entirely brake blocks (cast iron: soft, thick, a major wear item), not wheel tyre or rail. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:20, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

U.S. hatchet job?
This article has serious POV problem. All references are either from a U.S. government source, Department of Labor, or are from US based sources which have the word American as part of the name of the source. How can anyone give full credit to sources from one nation when the use of diesel engines are world wide?

The list of external sources are also either from U.S. government sources or are case studies published in U.S. media. In addition, none of the assertations are footnoted to specific references or external sources. --TGC55 (talk) 20:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

A few references

 * Health Effects of Diesel Exhaust A fact sheet by Cal/EPA's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment and the American Lung Association
 * Diesel Exhaust: A Critical Analysis of Emissions, Exposure, and Health Effects Summary of a Health Effects Institute (HEI) Special Report HEI Diesel Working Group
 * Diesel Exhaust and Air Pollution American Lung Association
 * 15:46, 25 February 2009 User:Fred Bauder

diesel/gasoline final results about particulate matter
test

you run your gasoline car with you in it in your closed  garage  for one hour i run my diesel car with me in it  in my closed  garage  for one hour

then we will discuss the final results about particulate matter

Wdl1961 (talk) 15:33, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
 * The lethal component of gasoline exhaust is carbon monoxide, not particulate matter. The alleged harm of particulate matter is that it can cause cancer and lung damage, but neither of those will kill you in an hour.
 * Then again, modern gasoline engines are so clean that the only thing you're likely to get from either experiment is a headache, or possibly dehydration and heat stroke (running any internal combustion engine in an enclosed garage for an hour will make said garage pretty hot.) Stian (talk) 15:36, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

This article

 * I made this article by assembling matter which was spread (with much duplication) across the pages Exhaust gas and Diesel particulate matter and Diesel fuel and Diesel exhaust air contaminants: see Content forking. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 16:12, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Occupational exposure
A section on occupational exposure is vital due to the serious risks involved in constant heavy exposure. I'm sure it and other sections on health issues can be edited to reduce duplication and conflation of occupational risks compared to those of the general public. User:Fred Bauder Talk 15:52, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Unsourced material
No one doubts that diesel fumes may have adverse health effects, however, so far the study upon which the carcinogenic claims rest is one involving miners in tightly enclosed areas next to diesel powered machines. That's very different than most exposures people suffer. As well, this whole article is rife with unsourced claims. It's not enough to say – the Germans tell us its bad – you need to have a quotation and a page number. There are a large number of improperly sourced claims in this article, so you can see why several readers think it violates NPV guidelines (I do too).Theonemacduff (talk) 02:19, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

Biodiesel is a very broad term - it is a group of fuels containing non-fossil oils (treated for transesetification achievement). However the hydrocarbons vary with different sources and treatments. Therefore not only nitrogen oxides vary in the exhaust but also many hydrocarbons, it depents on the hydrocarbon composition of the biofuel. In the article there is a statement: "All diesel engine exhaust emissions can be significantly reduced by using biodiesel fuel. Oxides of nitrogen do increase from a vehicle using biodiesel..." which is missing citation. As far as I know biodiesel fumes MAY have either increased or reduced hyrocarbon content, depending not only on the combustion process (as stated "injection timing") but also on the biodiesel source (respectively HC composition).81.161.249.222 (talk) 11:36, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Agreed with previous commenter. I am substantially concerned with the "All diesel engine exhaust emissions can be significantly reduced by using biodiesel fuel. Oxides of nitrogen do increase from a vehicle using biodiesel..." line, it is either oversimplified or downright incorrect. The primary factor influencing POH formation in combustion of aliphatic hydrocarbon fuels is temperature. Diesels burn at lower temperatures than otto cycle engines, therefore more POHs get formed. The difference between biodiesel and diesel is that the first one is an ester, the second is an alkane. A few steps into the reaction, the ester will be cracked near the carbonyl, eventually leading to an alkene and a formyl radical, which then react just like intermediates in normal diesel fuel do.

Biodiesel vs. Diesel also doesn't have anything to do with NOx. Due to the lower temperatures, NOx formation from diesel engines is fairly low to begin with, with prompt NO being the only feasible pathway. The prompt NO pathway is controlled by CH radical concentration, which is present regardless of if the starting molecule was an ester or alkane.

The material currently posted is both unsourced and incorrect.75.58.177.245 (talk) 21:35, 16 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I agree and whether I did or didn't, the material is unsourced. So I removed it. You could have too.MartinezMD (talk) 21:46, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

Tagged for NPOV
I have placed an NPOV maintenance notification on the article, because it's a mess. It seems like a tug-of-war betweeen "DIESEL IS CLEAN" proponents and "DIESEL IS TEH EVIL" proponents has taken place here. I have attempted to clean up the lede, which still contains facts not in the rest of the prose and go unreferenced, which generally come down to "Modern Diesels are like totally clean nowadays!", whenever nowadays might be. I've tried to tone those down. Sources are not always what they should be, especially when making or implying health claims. The entire section chemical components has notes that seem to want to stress, or at least imply, how dangerous diesel exhaust is to the point I'm a little surprised it doesn't contain an entry "water vapor, causes burns, and can lead to drowning when inhaled". I'll do some edits over the next few weeks, but I probably won't be able to fix it all in a period shorter than that. Feel free to help clean up the article. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 22:38, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the proposal was not moved. --BDD (talk) 16:56, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Diesel exhaust → Internal combustion engine exhaust gases – Please put your reason for moving here. KVDP (talk) 15:44, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I propose to move this article to "Internal combustion engine exhaust gases". This way, the scope of the article can be broadened and a comparison of the carcinogenic compounds between exhaust gases of: can be made. I even think there's more danger in the oxides than the fine dust from Diesel engines which lately is been getting an overly large amount of media attention. So, let's write an article and find out. KVDP (talk) 15:43, 11 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Diesel engine running on straight vegetable oil
 * Diesel engine running on petroDiesel
 * Diesel engine running on bioDiesel
 * gasoline engine running on gasoline
 * gasoline engine running on ethanol
 * gasoline engine running on biobutanol
 * gasoline engine running on biogas
 * gasoline engine running on natural gas


 * Oppose Instead you should create a new article at your suggested title as an overview article for the various types of ICE exhaust. This article is fairly large, and I don't see why diluting it to a more generic form would be better. I do see that there'd be a fair amount of overlap, but there's also a fair amount of specificity in this article as well. -- 70.24.244.158 (talk) 05:05, 12 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Oppose - mainly because I can't see the majority of people searching for "Internal combustion engine exhaust gases" over the more symplistic and common "Diesel exhast" - so they'll hit a redirect. Why not create your article and then we can see better where there is overlap and where there isn't? Thanks ツ Jenova  20  (email) 08:15, 13 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Oppose, for both sets of reasons cited above. Thanks, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 09:04, 16 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Oppose "IC" engine implies petrol/gasoline too. The emissions issues are distinctly different for the two groups of engines and should be covered separately. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:00, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Diesel Exhaust Exposure in Miners Linked to Lung Cancer
http://dceg.cancer.gov/news-events/linkage-newsletter/2012-07/research-publications/diesel-exhaust

New review article includes notes on cardiovascular effects of diesel: Expert position paper on air pollution and cardiovascular disease
Newby et al.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/eurheartj/ehu458 First published online: 9 December 2014

Advanced Access: http://eurheartj.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2014/12/08/eurheartj.ehu458

Eur Heart J. 2014 Dec 9. pii: ehu458. [Epub ahead of print]

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.190.133.143 (talk) 23:33, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Mothers exposed to fine particle pollution during the third trimester faced doubled risks that that the child would suffer from autism
Raanan Raz, Andrea L. Roberts, Kristen Lyall, Jaime E. Hart, Allan C. Just, Francine Laden and Marc G. Weisskopf

"Autism Spectrum Disorder and Particulate Matter Air Pollution before, during, and after Pregnancy: A Nested Case–Control Analysis within the Nurses’ Health Study II Cohort"

Environ Health Perspect; DOI:10.1289/ehp.1408133

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/1408133/

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/advpub/2014/12/ehp.1408133.acco.pdf

Autism risk linked to particulate air pollution

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/12/18/idUSL1N0U01ZX20141218

NEW YORK Thu Dec 18, 2014 12:01am EST

Reuters


 * There was no association between autism and fine particulate pollution before or early in pregnancy, or after the child was born. But high levels of exposure during the third trimester doubled the risk of autism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.190.133.143 (talk) 23:55, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Short-term diesel exhaust inhalation caused changes in DNA in a controlled human crossover study -
Jiang R, Jones MJ, Sava F, Kobor MS and Carlsten C Particle and Fibre Toxicology 2014, 11:71 (9 December 2014)

Short-term diesel exhaust inhalation in a controlled human crossover study is associated with changes in DNA methylation of circulating mononuclear cells in asthmatics

http://www.particleandfibretoxicology.com/content/pdf/s12989-014-0071-3.pdf (full free text)

http://www.biomedsearch.com/nih/Short-term-diesel-exhaust-inhalation/25487561.html

http://www.financialexpress.com/article/lifestyle/health/diesel-fumes-can-cause-harm-to-dna-study/28007/

http://www.biomedsearch.com/nih/Short-term-diesel-exhaust-inhalation/25487561.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ocdcntx (talk • contribs) 18:19, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Exhaust Gas Recirculation
Can someone who understands this topic please review and correct it. There is a lot in it that is either unclear or seems to be wrong. For example, I would expect that typically pressures would be higher in the exhaust manifold than in the inlet manifold, so why is a turbocharger required to pump exhaust gases into the inlet ? Perhaps this is only required when the inlet pressure is raised by a supercharger ? And how can introducing gasses depleted in oxygen make the fuel/gas mix leaner, or lead to greater efficiency ? g4oep — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.96.58.212 (talk) 13:00, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * There is nothing wrong with it. The turbocharger does not pump exhaust gas into the inlet. It runs off exhaust gas and has a separate impeller to drive fresh air into the intake. You're confusing that with the EGR that introduces exhaust gas into the engine to reduce temperature.MartinezMD (talk) 20:19, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Bullshit. The questions are valid. You don't need to be Einstein to see that displacing air with exhaust will make the fuel/air mix richer, not leaner, for the same amount of fuel and power output. The section is full of absurdities without proper explanation. Looking up Exhaust gas recirculation, I find some of the claims, like fuel efficency, to actually be wrong — the purpose is rather to reduce NOx emissions, which makes sense for a richer fuel/air mix. I'll go ahead and correct this. 84.209.119.158 (talk) 16:17, 6 December 2015 (UTC)
 * You are correct about the mix becoming richer. I misread him there, but using profanity is unnecessary. My response to him was about the turbo vs the EGR, which have two very different functions. Also, I just reread the EGR section and it does say the mix becomes richer. So I don't see what the error is. Care to point it out? MartinezMD (talk) 18:51, 6 December 2015 (UTC)
 * EGR is not intended to make the mixture (as a fuel / oxygen ratio) either richer nor leaner. The mixture control should remain unaffected by it. EGR has little to do with stoichiometry.
 * The purpose of EGR is two-fold: to dilute the reactive components of the air, making the specific heat capacity relative to fuel energy greater, thus reducing peak combustion temperatures. This is the condition that favours NOx production, so it reduces that whilst still having little effect on thermodynamic efficiency (as the dilution is done with hot exhaust at pressure, rather than ambient air). Secondly the exhaust contains a quantity of carbon dioxide (and monoxide, in a petrol engine). This displace the overall proportion of nitrogen, thus further reducing NOx production.
 * As low-power diesel exhaust can also contain significant quantities of unburned oxygen too, there can be a weakening effect on the mixture, but this is incidental and solid injection diesels don't much care anyway. Andy Dingley (talk) 19:49, 6 December 2015 (UTC)

The chemical components chart and carbon monoxide and greenhouse gas
Conspicuously missing from the chart and this article is carbon monoxide (carbon dioxide too), how it compares to gasoline engines, i.e, you can't commit suicide with diesel exhaust and the engines are safe for that reason in underground mines. Many people think that because diesels smell bad and put out black smoke that they are worse polluters, emit more greenhouse gas than gasoline engines.Raquel Baranow (talk) 15:29, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

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quantitative info and comparisons
It would be useful to add quantitative data on emissions and to show tabular comparisons between emissions from diesels with those of gasoline engines. Wcmead3 (talk) 18:22, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

DME fuel
I was surprised when I noticed that DME was not mentioned in the article because it is a potential diesel fuel and very clean. ––Nikolas Ojala (talk) 01:33, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

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