Guwahati, Feb 20: A comprehensive study by researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Mandi has revealed alarming health risks from traditional cooking practices that use biomass fuel in Assam, Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh.
Conducted in association with the Institut National de Recherche et de Sécurité (INRS), France and the National Physical Laboratory (CSIR-NPL, the study on the “detrimental effects of indoor air pollution resulting from traditional cooking practices in rural kitchens across the three Northeast Indian states” underscored the immediate need for rural communities in the region to opt for cleaner fuels.
In a series of three papers, the research team from IIT-Mandi, comprising Bijay Sharma, a Ph.D. scholar, and Sayantan Sarkar, assistant professor, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and his collaborators, analysed the extent and consequences of harmful emissions produced during indoor cooking using firewood and mixed biomass in the three states.
The study revealed that more than 50 percent of the rural population in the three Northeast Indian states continue to use traditional solid fuels such as firewood and mixed biomass for cooking, leading to the release of significant pollutants into the kitchen air.
The research aimed to gauge the severity and disease burden associated with the use of biomass cooking fuel compared to LPG-based cooking.
The researchers measured size-resolved concentrations of aerosols, which are particles suspended in the air, and toxic trace metals and carcinogenic organic substances bound with it, during cooking with firewood, mixed biomass, and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).
They modelled the deposition patterns of these particles and associated chemicals in various sections of the human respiratory system. The resulting inhalation exposure to these chemicals during cooking was then calculated.
Utilising the data, the researchers estimated the health impact (disease burden) on the rural Northeast Indian population, focusing on respiratory diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), pneumonia and various cancers, using the ‘Potential Years of Life Lost’ (PYLL) metric, which estimates the potential number of years lost in a population owing to premature death from ill health.
The study also revealed that exposure to harmful aerosols in firewood/biomass-using kitchens was two to 19 times higher than in LPG-using kitchens, with respiratory deposition ranging from 29 to 79 percent of the total aerosol concentration. The fraction of population using firewood and mixed biomass faced two to 57 times higher disease burden than LPG users.
Furthermore, the research found that the potential for oxidative stress, which leads to damaged cells, proteins and DNA, was likely to be four to five times higher among people using biomass in kitchens than those using LPG. This stress is driven by the inhalation of metals and organic chemicals produced during indoor cooking using biomass fuel.
Highlighting the uniqueness of the research, Sarkarsaid, “Our study combines real-world aerosol measurements in rural kitchens with dosimetry modelling to robustly estimate the impact of cooking emissions on the respiratory tract. It is the first effort to estimate disease burden caused by exposure to indoor cooking emissions in India in terms of potential years of life lost.”
“The study also measures for the first time the potential for oxidative stress resulting from such exposure in the Indian context, and quantifies the additional risk that biomass users face compared to those who use the cleaner alternative, LPG,” he said.
Recommendations made in the study include making LPG more accessible, improving cookstove programmes, spreading awareness in rural areas and funding local solutions besides organising health camps for rural women.