Live healthier in 2026 by breathing cleaner air at home |
I have a health goal for the new year that doesn’t require me to get out of bed earlier or eat fewer cookies. I am an atmospheric chemist and will be committing to clean air at home.
People in the U.S. spend as much as 90% of their lives indoors. Overall, air pollution is responsible for approximately 135,000 premature deaths per year in the U.S. And levels of some chemicals can be two to five times higher in indoor air than outdoors.
Fortunately, there are some straightforward ways to improve your home’s air quality this year, in three major categories of activity.
Cooking is a major source of indoor air pollution.
Not all chemicals that cooking produces are bad, but some react to form other chemicals that like to clump together to form particulate matter. When inhaled, these particles enter the lungs and can then pass into the bloodstream, increasing people’s risk of heart disease and decreasing lung function.
The amount of particulate matter produced from your cooking depends on the food type, oil used and cooking temperature. High-fat-content foods, such as cheese, pork and bacon, emit the most particles, especially when cooked at high temperatures. Sunflower oil produces the least amount of particulate matter, followed by vegetable oil and then olive oil.
Cooking with a gas stove produces more particulate matter than with an electric stove, and the gas stove also emits other hazardous chemicals such as nitrogen dioxide and