TallGuyJohninBKK

7 minutes ago, EnlightenedAtheist said:

However, the truth, the underlying reason for the complaint is that we would not want to tarnish the image of Chiang Mai  (or Thailand) as having a pristine environment.

Well, I'd also say part might be that one topic we just can't talk about, and the other part might be just plain simple retribution.

8 minutes ago, peperobi said:

Enjoy is no t Chang Mai. The government must really do something against! Or maybe the SUPERCOP BIG JOKE!

 

I guess if I were to believe ONE poster here, I must assume your photos are from Myanmar. Because at least one person here keeps insisting there is no burning going on in CM!!!  

So I guess the governor has now answered the request of his vassals for help in reducing local smog levels. And that's to go after the entity that organized the clean air petition.

6 minutes ago, Lakegeneve said:

Also to update you, 100 of the first batch of NGV buses are already on the streets plying routes for the last week. The next batch of 100 is due at the end of April and another batch of 100 in May. So you should start seeing them around in the coming months.

 

They still need another 2k buses once these 489 are delivered so that might take  few more decades!

Ahh... I missed this little item in the news in the past week:

http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/bangkok-commuters-can-now-enjoy-new-buses-five-routes/

5 hours ago, bluesofa said:

 

A difficult subject, but a reduction by 90% within two years? These bureaucrats are living in another world.

 

It'll take em at least two more years just to decide who to place on the committees that will need to be formed to come up with the plans for the committees that will be tasked with coming up with the plans for reducing HIV/AIDS by 2020...  And then by around 2120, if Bangkok is still above water, they might actually end up adopting some plan.

18 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

The pollution soup is probably a lot thicker in Beijing, so maybe not comparable to Bangkok, but according to this, not much different unless you get above 400 m.

 

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/less-pm25-pollution-higher-lower-floor

That's an interesting article, EOW.  Thanks for finding and posting it. And if it's correct, then it's about what I guessed earlier.

Quote

To get to 400 meters, we’d need to live on the 129^th floor. For now, we earth-dwellers can’t hope to outclimb pollution.

However, I do think there would be more of a consistent difference if someone was taking a sidewalk reading along Sukhumvit Road and then going up to the 20-something-th floor of a building. But again, I'm guessing.

20 hours ago, balo said:

Okay I will become the "official" AQI reader for Pattaya City once my new gadget arrives .    

Hopefully my balcony readings (23rd floor) will be a lot better than out in the traffic. 

 

Funny you mention the height issue.... lately, in one of these threads, someone asked me about whether the readings were any better way up high vs down at ground level.  I have no idea, and haven't been up high, nor do I live up high, to check something like that.

My guess is, there isn't likely any big difference, apart from any impact if you're right along a busy street with a lot of traffic at ground level. On a quiet street vs up high, I'd be surprised. But, it would be great for someone to actually test that with a sensor and report back the result. I'd sure like to know, rather than guessing.

2 hours ago, sfokevin said:

I have the Xaiomi’s and yes the 3 hour switch to auto mode (A mode that is useless in low pollution areas) is a pain - I assume it is there to meet some sort of energy standard... but the app can be used to set automation rules to reset it back to the high fan mode basically turning the auto mode off and favorite mode on every 2.5 hours...

Thanks Kevin!  BTW, is that three-hour revert to auto mode feature the same, or different, on the 2 vs. the 2s?

Edward, you've posted a number of times about the homemade purifier you've made with a fan and a HEPA filter attached to the front using the general SmartAir method. And have posted photos of your dirty filter.

But have you ever posted any PM2.5 sensor results of just what that device does operating in its room, whatever size that may be? In other words, what kind of a PM2.5 reduction does it actually accomplish over what period of time running?

I believe, as I said above, those who have the Xiaomi units here have previously posted saying that the auto mode 3 hour deal can be overcome via settings with the smartphone app. But strangely, the SmartAir - Particlecounting sites never make any mention of the smartphone app controls in their writeups.

8 minutes ago, jenny2017 said:

My friend told me that he's got the Ebola virus...

 Or it could be the super resistant form of gonorrhea acquired in some unnamed SE Asian country...

Ahhh rats!!!  It's regular old HIV, not the super gonorrhea....

2 hours ago, wgdanson said:

The doctor or clinic who removed his facial tattoos is <deleted>''  good if thats him in the top photo.

They really ought to start including the photo captions with the photos posted with these articles, because oftentimes, it isn't at all clear just who is being shown in the photo, such as the case here with the bespectacled accountant looking guy in the OP photo, who many folks might unknowingly believe was the Gerber guy who's the subject of the article.

41 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

A fresh flavor today in impeachment porn.

BRIBERY!

Is "trump" our briber in chief?

 

Reading about this guy and his antics makes me feel so DIRTY!!!  

6 hours ago, Lakegeneve said:

The SRT Board has to have some sort of record when they approve the budget for purchasing 7 new, 5 car sets in mid 2013 and it takes at least 8 years for any new trains to be running!

You're certainly the expert on these things, LG.

But aren't the SRT getting some strong competition for that esteemed title from the BMTA and their still never-put-into-service NGV buses? How many rounds of procurement (5 or more), and the residents of BKK still have no new NGV buses to show for it.

5 minutes ago, IsaanFam said:

 

I am also thinking of buying some Xaomi 2S but this report got me a bit worried:

 

http://particlecounting.tumblr.com/post/158552944216/xiaomi-auto-mode-leaves-air-unsafe-86-hours

I believe, that's a reprint version of an article on a different website (smartairfilters) that's been posted here before...

A couple of pertinent issues on that:

1. the testing they're doing was with the regular 2 version, not the subsequent and generally considered better 2s version. Some reports have suggested the built-in sensor in the original 2 wasn't very accurate and/or that the unit's auto setting resulted in overly high PM2.5 levels.

2. With the 2s, supposedly, Xiaomi went with a better built-in laser sensor. And, folks here with these units, I believe have indicated that you can adjust the settings in the smartphone app that can control the unit so as to avoid the overly high PM2.5 levels on the machine's default auto setting.

If I had a choice, I'd go with the 2s over the regular 2 model. But I believe SFOKevin above has both.

33 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

Lots of fun fact here:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particulates

 

Like: "Because salt spray over the oceans is the overwhelmingly most common form of particulate in the atmosphere, anthropogenic aerosols—those made by human activities—currently account for about 10 percent of the total mass of aerosols in our atmosphere."

Thanks for that!  Seriously mind numbing reading....

Although, in trying to digest it, it appears to be saying that not all aerosols/particulates are created equal, and the ones created by human activity tend to be smaller in size compared to larger sizes for naturally occurring particulates, like the sea salt example you referred to. And, of course, the smallest/smaller ones tend to be the most harmful to health.

Buried down at the bottom, meanwhile, was an interesting reference to Bangkok Thailand:

Quote

 

Particulate matter studies in Bangkok Thailand from 2008 indicated a 1.9% increased risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, and 1.0% risk of all disease for every 10 micrograms per cubic meter. Levels averaged 65 in 1996, 68 in 2002, and 52 in 2004. Decreasing levels may be attributed to conversions of diesel to natural gas combustion as well as improved regulations.^[75

 

And in looking at the source document, those estimates appear based solely on PM10 particulate, not the smaller and more harmful PM2.5 particulate. So the estimates in that study are probably on the mild side compared to reality.

2008 Health Effects of Air Pollution in Bangkok.pdf

3 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

Does the sensor react to a good old fart?

 I can honestly say... I haven't tested that yet!

But, I'm guessing, that would be more in the category of VOC as opposed to PM2.5! 

Just now, edwardandtubs said:

Next experiment: take your sensor outside and measure the air quality right next to one of the many barbecue street hawkers.

They're SMOKIN!  My indoors stuff isn't, at least, not visibly...

4 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

You have correctly been using micro gram/m3 for your PM2.5 measurements. The above article is just describing the size of the PM2.5 particles.

Oyyy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Now I've got a headache... and really embarrassed!!!! 

BTW, I was doing some small cooking in the kitchen in the past couple days -- no flame/gas at all and no visible smoke. But nonetheless, it drove my PM2.5 sensor thru the roof.... Went from 6µ to 80µ indoors in a matter of moments...

And that was just roasting some peanuts in the toaster oven at 120C, and making some waffles in an electric waffle maker. So I now realize, my cooking is contributing to Thailand's PM2.5 problem!!!

8 minutes ago, sfokevin said:

^^^ They are rates at 40 watts each... Given my 3k baht electric bill it’s a drop in the bucket...

Glad to hear that!

My Sharp unit in the bedroom, which normally I run on medium, is rated at 30 watts, and 51 watts if I run it on high, which I rarely have needed to do.

But my "beast" Honeywell 50250 in the much larger living room is rated at 100, 165 and 200 watts on L/M/H, and I'm usually running it on medium most of the time.

So the Sharp bedroom unit running about 12 hours a day at 30 watts, and then the Honeywell living room unit (when we're home) running the other 12 hours a day at 165 watts...

Needless to say, that's another reason I didn't want to be running the Honeywell all night and overnight into the mornings in the bedroom -- in addition to still using it in the living room-kitchen during the days.

But, while my Sharp unit is basically a perfect fit capacity-wise for our 18 sf mt main bedroom, I've got a combined open living room-kitchen area that's almost 50 meters. And the less expensive Sharp unit and others like it just aren't going to handle that -- unless I went out and started buying and maintaining multiple purifiers.

BTW, I just realized (me being an American who does poorly with the metric system and math in general) that I've been using the wrong measurement term to refer to PM2.5...

I've wrongly been using the measurement term of "micrograms," and I now realize, the correct measurement term for PM2.5 and PM10 is MICROMETERS. Sorry for the error!

I never could figure out how to find the symbol for "micrometers" on my Thai-EN Windows keyboard, so today I went hunting for it, and found it's accessible via the Character Map mini-program in Win 10.

µ µ µ µ µ µ µ µ µ µ  -- live and learn....

3 hours ago, sfokevin said:

I’m in Hang Dong just south on CM...

Outdoors 2.5pm = 128-134pm

Lounge 2,5pm = 12-16pm

Bedroom 2.5pm = 6-9pm (Last Night)

I have the Xaiomi Air Purifiers (2s & 2) one in lounge and another in adjoining dining room... and another in the bedroom

 

Kevin, thanks much for the post above....

You've been running your purifiers longer than me at this point. Do you have any feel for how much difference running them ends up making in your monthly electric bill?

I'm not looking forward to getting my next bill in a few days... Before it was air con. Now it's air con plus air purifiers.  I'm nervous....

2 hours ago, chub said:

Overall, the lack of service information, lack of publicity, the widely spaced, unmarked stops which are not cleared of parking and have no waiting shelters, seems to suggest this route, like its predecessor, is designed by people who have no concept of how a bus service should operate. How can it credibly be called ‘Smart’.

 

All that would be considered "Smart" if the purpose was never for it to succeed in the first place.

8 minutes ago, robblok said:

You know me I am happy for any corruption to be attacked so I do applaud this but its not as if these guys have a good track record. They allowed this for years.

My view exactly.

I guess, after reading probably the 1000th Prawit article in the news over the past few months -- NACC doing this or doing that, NACC may do this or may do that -- and knowing it's all going to lead to nothing -- has put me in an anti-corruption doubting mood.

But then again, as regards the government officials:

--Anyone going to be held responsible for the fake bomb detector fraud?

--Anyone going to be held responsible for the beating death of the Army recruits?

--What about the corruption/fraud allegations regarding the Army park in Hua Hin?

--What about the diverted funds/crappy work done on the school playgrounds nationwide?

--How about the five or so rounds of NGV bus procurement that have failed to produce any usable buses?

--Anyone being held responsible for abjectly failing to ensure safe public transport services?

And there's more, many more, of course. But that's just a sampling.