Publications by authors named "Eric D Lebel"

Article Synopsis
  • Gas and propane stoves release nitrogen dioxide (NO) indoors, with unknown exposure levels across different U.S. demographic groups.
  • The average long-term NO exposure from these stoves is 4.0 parts per billion, potentially leading to about 50,000 pediatric asthma cases due to this exposure.
  • Smaller homes and certain racial/ethnic households experience disproportionately higher NO exposure compared to larger homes and the national average.
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Article Synopsis
  • - The review highlights the use of organosulfur compounds as odorants in natural gas to help detect leaks, but points out that there are currently no established regulatory exposure limits for these compounds.
  • - Analysis of 22 studies revealed that prolonged exposure to natural gas odorants is linked to various health symptoms like headaches, respiratory issues, and skin irritation, indicating potential health risks.
  • - The findings suggest the need for more detailed research on the health impacts of these odorants at lower exposure levels and recommend better practices for their use in natural gas.
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Exposure pathways to the carcinogen benzene are well-established from tobacco smoke, oil and gas development, refining, gasoline pumping, and gasoline and diesel combustion. Combustion has also been linked to the formation of nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, and formaldehyde indoors from gas stoves. To our knowledge, however, no research has quantified the formation of benzene indoors from gas combustion by stoves.

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The presence of hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) entrained in end-use natural gas (NG) is an understudied source of human health risks. We performed trace gas analyses on 185 unburned NG samples collected from 159 unique residential NG stoves across seven geographic regions in California. Our analyses commonly detected 12 HAPs with significant variability across region and gas utility.

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Natural gas stoves in >40 million U.S. residences release methane (CH)─a potent greenhouse gas─through post-meter leaks and incomplete combustion.

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California hosts ∼124,000 abandoned and plugged (AP) oil and gas wells, ∼38,000 idle wells, and ∼63,000 active wells, whose methane (CH) emissions remain largely unquantified at levels below ∼2 kg CH h. We sampled 121 wells using two methods: a rapid mobile plume integration method (detection ∼0.5 g CH h) and a more sensitive static flux chamber (detection ∼1 × 10 g CH h).

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Methane emissions from natural gas appliances remain the least characterized portion of the fossil-fuel supply chain. Here we examine water heaters from 64 northern California homes to (1) quantify methane emissions from natural gas leaks and incomplete combustion while off, turning on or off, and in steady-state operation from 35 homes; and (2) characterize daily usage patterns over ∼1-2 months per water heater to estimate activity factors from 46 homes. Individual tankless water heaters emitted 2390 [95% CI: 2250, 2540] g CH yr on average, 0.

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