Chiang Mai Hit By Smog For Five Consecutive Days

[Priceless]

For Priceless - apologies that I am unable to quote previous text but I'm having system difficulties this morning it seems:

You know only too well Priceless the issues I have with some of the graphs you display here, but for the record and for the benefit of anyone else who does not know, I don't believe that they are truly representative of the air quality in CM. How can they possibly be so when the data on which they are based is drawn from one single fixed monitoring station and one mobile station - I do not believe that sampling of that size can possibly be representative of the air quality in CM - for me that's akin to taking one persons temperature and suggesting that everyone in the city has the same reading.

Secondly, viewers of the graphs can be forgiven for believing that they show the difference in air quality between four different locations in Thailand and drawing a conclusion that the air quality in CM is often better than some beach locations. Maybe that is the case but as far as I can see that is not a valid conclusion since only PM10 and not PM2.5 readings are captured and measured. Since PM2.5 is arguably a far more dangerous threat, measuring PM10 in isolation and basing conclusions on that reading alone is not helpful.

Finally, on the subject of overall air quality: over time we have debated rigorously the issue of air quality in CM and frequently mentioned the viewpoint of the medical profession regarding pollution related illnesses. Prominent doctors at local hospitals have written articles concerning the rate of new cancer cases in the North, the numbers of deaths from heart and respiratory disease and many individuals have provided anecdotal evidence confirming the impact of poor air quality on their health. But you largely dismiss such data and refer back to your graphs as the sole source of authoritative evidence because no large scale well organized and managed survey of those things has been undertaken. As a statistician and a purist you are perhaps right to ignore the "hearsay", but anyone wishing to understand the true state of the air quality in CM will certainly not ignore such things. In summary, your graphs are misleading and present a barrier to understanding the true picture rather than becoming a part of it.

My sincere apologies for the very boring post below. I have posted everything in it before, but since "chiang mai" developed very convenient "system difficulties this morning", I have no choice but to repeat a lot of old stuff.

I quite agree with "chiang mai" on one thing: The world would be sooo much better, if only it were perfect.

Now to your other points:

There is a total of 33 air pollution measuring stations in Thailand, 8 in Bangkok and 25 in the provinces. Chiang Mai is the only province with more than one station, one at City Hall and one at Uparaj College. (The mobile one is useless for any statistical purpose as it is exactly that, i.e. mobile, and one never knows where a given reading is taken. My impression is that it is at least partly used for checking air quality whenever any member of the royal family is visiting.) To compensate for this dearth of measuring points I off and on check the correlation between the Chiang Mai station, the Uparaj College one and the one in Lampang. These correlations are quite strong (City Hall vs Uparaj usually >0.9 and City Hall vs Lampang >0.7) which indicates that the "Chiang Mai" values measured at City Hall are quite representative for the larger area. To disregard the available facts because one would prefer to have even better information lays a solid foundation for ignorance.

As concerns PM<2.5 measurements as opposed to PM<10: There are (as far as I know) only two countries in the world where regular measurements of PM<2.5 have been made for a long enough time to draw any significant conclusions, they are USA and Canada. In e.g. Europe, these measurements are a recent occurrence, which is demonstrated by the fact that the EU does not yet have a standard for this type of pollution. There will be a "Target" from 1 January 2010 and a "Limit" from 1 January 2015, though only for yearly averages, there will be no daily values. We are living in a 3rd world country, so I don't think you should hold your breath waiting for Thailand to introduce such measurements. However, the World Health Organisation quotes research that determines the "normal" relationship between PM<2.5 and PM<10 concentrations ( http://www.euro.who.int/Document/E90038.pdf page 277) in our type of environment: "[The] ratio of 0.5 is close to that observed typically in urban areas in developing countries". Consequently, if you assume that half of the PM<10 concentration is in fact PM<2.5, you won't be far off the mark.

As regards the medical consequences of different types of pollution and other factors, I am not qualified to have an opinion of my own. I have however read some reports on the relationship between lung cancer and pollution (e.g. http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=1212389 and http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlere...i?artid=2531137 and http://pt.wkhealth.com/pt/re/resp/abstract...#33;8091!-1 and http://jjco.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/39/2/133 ). These reports all seem to indicate that Particulate Matter pollution is a very minor factor in these cases. What I can say, from a statistical point oof view, is that if pollution were a major factor one would expect much higher incidences of lung cancer in areas with much higher levels of pollution (e.g. Samut Prakarn, Sara Buri and the Din Daeng area of Bangkok). This is not the case!

As for "anyone wishing to understand the true state of the air quality in CM", you are obviously not such a person, since you choose to ignore whatever factual evidence there is, and prefer to rely on your own impressions and hearsay.

Do not expect any further comments from me on posts by "chiang mai", as I am now adding him to my (very short) ignore list.

/ Priceless

[chiang mai]

For Priceless - apologies that I am unable to quote previous text but I'm having system difficulties this morning it seems:

You know only too well Priceless the issues I have with some of the graphs you display here, but for the record and for the benefit of anyone else who does not know, I don't believe that they are truly representative of the air quality in CM. How can they possibly be so when the data on which they are based is drawn from one single fixed monitoring station and one mobile station - I do not believe that sampling of that size can possibly be representative of the air quality in CM - for me that's akin to taking one persons temperature and suggesting that everyone in the city has the same reading.

Secondly, viewers of the graphs can be forgiven for believing that they show the difference in air quality between four different locations in Thailand and drawing a conclusion that the air quality in CM is often better than some beach locations. Maybe that is the case but as far as I can see that is not a valid conclusion since only PM10 and not PM2.5 readings are captured and measured. Since PM2.5 is arguably a far more dangerous threat, measuring PM10 in isolation and basing conclusions on that reading alone is not helpful.

Finally, on the subject of overall air quality: over time we have debated rigorously the issue of air quality in CM and frequently mentioned the viewpoint of the medical profession regarding pollution related illnesses. Prominent doctors at local hospitals have written articles concerning the rate of new cancer cases in the North, the numbers of deaths from heart and respiratory disease and many individuals have provided anecdotal evidence confirming the impact of poor air quality on their health. But you largely dismiss such data and refer back to your graphs as the sole source of authoritative evidence because no large scale well organized and managed survey of those things has been undertaken. As a statistician and a purist you are perhaps right to ignore the "hearsay", but anyone wishing to understand the true state of the air quality in CM will certainly not ignore such things. In summary, your graphs are misleading and present a barrier to understanding the true picture rather than becoming a part of it.

My sincere apologies for the very boring post below. I have posted everything in it before, but since "chiang mai" developed very convenient "system difficulties this morning", I have no choice but to repeat a lot of old stuff.

I quite agree with "chiang mai" on one thing: The world would be sooo much better, if only it were perfect.

Now to your other points:

There is a total of 33 air pollution measuring stations in Thailand, 8 in Bangkok and 25 in the provinces. Chiang Mai is the only province with more than one station, one at City Hall and one at Uparaj College. (The mobile one is useless for any statistical purpose as it is exactly that, i.e. mobile, and one never knows where a given reading is taken. My impression is that it is at least partly used for checking air quality whenever any member of the royal family is visiting.) To compensate for this dearth of measuring points I off and on check the correlation between the Chiang Mai station, the Uparaj College one and the one in Lampang. These correlations are quite strong (City Hall vs Uparaj usually >0.9 and City Hall vs Lampang >0.7) which indicates that the "Chiang Mai" values measured at City Hall are quite representative for the larger area. To disregard the available facts because one would prefer to have even better information lays a solid foundation for ignorance.

As concerns PM<2.5 measurements as opposed to PM<10: There are (as far as I know) only two countries in the world where regular measurements of PM<2.5 have been made for a long enough time to draw any significant conclusions, they are USA and Canada. In e.g. Europe, these measurements are a recent occurrence, which is demonstrated by the fact that the EU does not yet have a standard for this type of pollution. There will be a "Target" from 1 January 2010 and a "Limit" from 1 January 2015, though only for yearly averages, there will be no daily values. We are living in a 3rd world country, so I don't think you should hold your breath waiting for Thailand to introduce such measurements. However, the World Health Organisation quotes research that determines the "normal" relationship between PM<2.5 and PM<10 concentrations ( http://www.euro.who.int/Document/E90038.pdf page 277) in our type of environment: "[The] ratio of 0.5 is close to that observed typically in urban areas in developing countries". Consequently, if you assume that half of the PM<10 concentration is in fact PM<2.5, you won't be far off the mark.

As regards the medical consequences of different types of pollution and other factors, I am not qualified to have an opinion of my own. I have however read some reports on the relationship between lung cancer and pollution (e.g. http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=1212389 and http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlere...i?artid=2531137 and http://pt.wkhealth.com/pt/re/resp/abstract...#33;8091!-1 and http://jjco.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/39/2/133 ). These reports all seem to indicate that Particulate Matter pollution is a very minor factor in these cases. What I can say, from a statistical point oof view, is that if pollution were a major factor one would expect much higher incidences of lung cancer in areas with much higher levels of pollution (e.g. Samut Prakarn, Sara Buri and the Din Daeng area of Bangkok). This is not the case!

As for "anyone wishing to understand the true state of the air quality in CM", you are obviously not such a person, since you choose to ignore whatever factual evidence there is, and prefer to rely on your own impressions and hearsay.

Do not expect any further comments from me on posts by "chiang mai", as I am now adding him to my (very short) ignore list.

/ Priceless

That's a pretty arrogant reply Priceless, is that how you end all your debates in life, ignore the other people in them!

As predicted and stated at the outset of this thread, there is little point in having these circular discussions because they get us nowhere since we both disagree as to the quality of the available data and the conclusions that can be successfully drawn from it - since I have now been elevated to your ignore list (I consider this arrogant but a privilege nevertheless) you will not know this however, too bad. I am however with Mapguy when he says that he wishes we could have a cohesive debate on this subject but it seems that whilst some are so entrenched that is unlikely to ever happen on this forum, again, too bad.

Edited August 6, 2009 by chiang mai

[Humbugcat]

Thank you for the photos Donnyboy. It would be really helpful to know when they were taken. Does Chiang Mai start to look like this in early February or is this much later?

[Ulysses G.]

Priceless has explained to me that he does a lot of research to present the best possible factual evidence that is available to support his point of view on pollution in Chiang Mai. If I understand correctly, he feels that we have a real problem at certain times of year, but, in general, pollution is worse in some other parts of Thailand and is not as bad here as some members would like to suggest.

He feels that a few posters have no interest in facts, but will twist the truth and use any sort of rationalization to make the situation appear far worse than it really is, for their own personal reasons.

He finds arguing with folks who have no facts to support their premise very frustrating and thinks that it is pretty much pointless anyway, as they are not going to listen to any actual evidence that he presents.

He tends to put these very few posters on his ignore list after he has explained himself a sufficient number of times to grow sick and tired of it.

He rather devote his time to searching out the latest facts as they become known instead of arguing with people who have no intention of seeing anything other than they want to see.

[chiang mai]

Priceless has explained to me that he does a lot of research to present the best possible factual evidence that is available to support his point of view on pollution in Chiang Mai. If I understand correctly, he feels that we have a real problem at certain times of year, but, in general, pollution is worse in some other parts of Thailand and is not as bad here as some members would like to suggest.

He feels that a few posters have no interest in facts, but will twist the truth and use any sort of rationalization to make the situation appear far worse than it really is, for their own personal reasons.

He finds arguing with folks who have no facts to support their premise very frustrating and thinks that it is pretty much pointless anyway, as they are not going to listen to any actual evidence that he presents.

He tends to put these very few posters on his ignore list after he has explained himself a sufficient number of times to grow sick and tired of it.

He rather devote his time to searching out the latest facts as they become known instead of arguing with people who have no intention of seeing anything other than they want to see.

UG, don't be a prat, you're an intellegent man and you know better!

It should be blatantly obvious to anyone reading this and previous threads on this subject that nobody has said that the data Priceless has put forth is wrong merely that it is inconclusive - as a result the conclusions he has drawn on the data supplied are simply premature and I believe, inaccurate. Take it to the next level and add to the argument and maybe I for one will be convinced - but please don't simply put up the same graphs and continue to dismiss out of hand any arguments that run contrary to those early conclusions, that's childish as is ignoring other people's views.

I for one have no interest in twisting facts but I remain keen to make sure the factual picture is complete - I think perhaps the difference in approach between Priceless and myself on this issue is that Priceless is determined to maintain factual accuracy of his limited statistics whilst I am more keen to ensure the entire process is of deriving the underlying data is complete!

Now, I trust your post doesn't mean that we've developed a new line of communication on this subject because that would be a bit too much. Perhaps better that we agree to disagree and wait in anticipation of new and more conclusive data to surface on which we can all agree, yes?

[gatorhead333]

ug,

this is like one flew over the cookoo nest! the air quality sucks here during a few months ,it is terrible, it is poisen ,it is killing us period..

but so is the smoke from everything else on earth... the pesticides in our vegetables,the crap fed to our livestock.. even the food served to us we pay to eat

things be bad .. so a big boo hoo. so what.

and why are people so crazy about again something they have no control over at all.

once this is all fixed it will mean the whole wide world had cured global warming.... things would have to be that good all over.

that will not happen just like CM air qua;lity will always bite it from feb to end of march .

lets worry about the big picture,,,...like

MY CATS SEES DEAD PEOPLE

Edited August 6, 2009 by gatorhead333

[Donnyboy]

Thank you for the photos Donnyboy. It would be really helpful to know when they were taken. Does Chiang Mai start to look like this in early February or is this much later?

sorry humbugcat, those were found on google images but are of CM

imo it has varied over the years on when the smog starts, but it would be fair to assume around Feb

and, i dont need to look at any graphs or what ever, i just notice its crappy haze to be in!

Edited August 6, 2009 by Donnyboy

[Priceless]

Priceless has explained to me that he does a lot of research to present the best possible factual evidence that is available to support his point of view on pollution in Chiang Mai. If I understand correctly, he feels that we have a real problem at certain times of year, but, in general, pollution is worse in some other parts of Thailand and is not as bad here as some members would like to suggest.

He feels that a few posters have no interest in facts, but will twist the truth and use any sort of rationalization to make the situation appear far worse than it really is, for their own personal reasons.

He finds arguing with folks who have no facts to support their premise very frustrating and thinks that it is pretty much pointless anyway, as they are not going to listen to any actual evidence that he presents.

He tends to put these very few posters on his ignore list after he has explained himself a sufficient number of times to grow sick and tired of it.

He rather devote his time to searching out the latest facts as they become known instead of arguing with people who have no intention of seeing anything other than they want to see.

You are quite right, UG, but one could put it differently: As always in cases like this, and in the social sciences, complete and absolutely reliable data are not, and never will be, available. There are (at least) two ways of dealing with such situations:

- Since complete data is not available, let's ignore what data there is and stick to opinions and hypotheses

OR

- Since complete data is not available, let's use what we have, try to verify its validity and reliability and then attempt to extract as much information as we can from it (obviously without claiming to have the absolute or final truth).

I think it has become quite clear over the years that I try to adhere to the second approach

/ Priceless

[chiang mai]

This whole thing reminds me of an episode of the Outer Limits from years ago, odd to say the very least.

Priceless, just want you to know that we all love you. Opps, sorry, I mean UG, will you please tell .......

[gatorhead333]

This whole thing reminds me of an episode of the Outer Limits from years ago, odd to say the very least.

Priceless, just want you to know that we all love you. Opps, sorry, I mean UG, will you please tell .......

meanwhile my cats still see dead people....

they seem to care nothing about the CM air quality... the dead people don't care ,so said my cats..

the cats do care a lot about this smokey air problem and they worry about global warming too....

late at night ..i see them staring out the window for hours..

the grey kitty turned 17 years old july 3 2009. he started seeing dead people when he was 9 week old he told me..

the tigger kitty is 3 he is worried about the air too, He wants the long life as the grey kitty has had but worrys that he is trapped in CM with me and doesn't have a preyer...

Edited August 6, 2009 by gatorhead333

[Ulysses G.]

This whole thing reminds me of an episode of the Outer Limits from years ago, odd to say the very least.

Priceless, just want you to know that we all love you. Opps, sorry, I mean UG, will you please tell .......

I don't actually talk to him. I channel this stuff.

He says... thanks, but he is still going to ignore you anyway!

[Mapguy]

Phew!

On balance, I think, a lot of the points Pointless makes are quite solid, but his fixation with such limited data and refusal to accept other research and information of many sorts unfortunately warps his judgment. I have no argument about using what measurement data are available for some statistical analysis (what is generally referred to as the "best available data"), but (to follow Priceless'es own admission) what is available for his sort of analysis is very, very limited for a couple of reasons. So, to find a solution one has to look for other evidence which numbers might not be so "crunchable."

Otherwise, why so snippy, Pointless ?! Leave the room in a huff ??!! You have often said that there is serious seasonal pollution in Chiang Mai, but your approach to dealing with it can sometimes be simply dysfunctional. I'll leave it at that. Poster "Chiang Mai" has been quite clear above in expressing the difficulty with your approach.

Otherwise, UG has often made the valid point that air pollution doesn't seem to bother some people very much. That's true. And, as I recall, he has once or twice over the past couple of years this discussion has been going on, expressed sympathy for those who are indeed affected by the rotten air from mid-February into early April. What else of value do you have to offer, UG ?

Numerous sources of information have been posted by me and by Priceless from time to time on the various threads devoted to this topic. I, for one, hope that he continues to do so. If I find something of interest, I'll continue to post it. In fact, I have something in hand now. I'll add it in a moment. Can't do it on a "fast reply."

Finally, don't you think we ought to be spending more energy on solving the problem?

Edited August 6, 2009 by Mapguy

[Mapguy]

Priceless has explained to me that he does a lot of research to present the best possible factual evidence that is available to support his point of view on pollution in Chiang Mai. If I understand correctly, he feels that we have a real problem at certain times of year, but, in general, pollution is worse in some other parts of Thailand and is not as bad here as some members would like to suggest.

He feels that a few posters have no interest in facts, but will twist the truth and use any sort of rationalization to make the situation appear far worse than it really is, for their own personal reasons.

He finds arguing with folks who have no facts to support their premise very frustrating and thinks that it is pretty much pointless anyway, as they are not going to listen to any actual evidence that he presents.

He tends to put these very few posters on his ignore list after he has explained himself a sufficient number of times to grow sick and tired of it.

He rather devote his time to searching out the latest facts as they become known instead of arguing with people who have no intention of seeing anything other than they want to see.

Here is some information about local people that may be of interest to those who want to join constructively to improve things.

HBFTransportEventJune09_Report.pdf

[Ulysses G.]

Perhaps better that we agree to disagree and wait in anticipation of new and more conclusive data to surface on which we can all agree, yes?

That is the whole problem, as far as I am concerned. Most likely, we will all be long dead and buried before any "conclusive" data comes out that we could all agree on. However, Priceless has done an excellent job of putting the problem into perspective using the factual data that is available now.

I can not really blame him for growing weary of presenting valid statistical evidence in order to argue with foes armed only with feelings and conjecture.

[chiang mai]

Perhaps better that we agree to disagree and wait in anticipation of new and more conclusive data to surface on which we can all agree, yes?

That is the whole problem, as far as I am concerned. Most likely, we will all be long dead and buried before any "conclusive" data comes out that we could all agree on. However, Priceless has done an excellent job of putting the problem into perspective using the factual data that is available now.

I can not really blame him for growing weary of presenting valid statistical evidence in order to argue with foes armed only with feelings and conjecture.

I'm certain that the people of years past who thought the world was flat must have felt the same way.

[Ulysses G.]

Sorry, but you have it backwards. The scientists who knew the world was round were the ones with the facts. The flat world people just "knew" that they would be proven right if we all just ignored the evidence long enough.

Edited August 7, 2009 by Ulysses G.

[CobraSnakeNecktie]

Sorry, but you have it backwards. The scientists who knew the world was round were the ones with the facts. The flat world people just "knew" that they would be proven right if we all just ignored the evidence long enough.

has anybody figured out where the 2 or 3 monitoring equipment is located?

Uparaj College is in the old town? but where?

ChiangMai I thought I read is at Phuphing palace

Chiang Mai is supposed to be near the provincial complex.

What is the setup at CMU which is west of the computer science buildings?

Data is worthwhile if its representative. In the US for example they actually put the monitoring equipment where the pollution is bad and not trying to avoid it.

Let's dig a little more into the data collection quality and obvious shortfalls like ignoring PM<2.5 and cancer causing pollutants like benzene(from petrol stations) which aren't even monitored in CM.

[Priceless]

Sorry, but you have it backwards. The scientists who knew the world was round were the ones with the facts. The flat world people just "knew" that they would be proven right if we all just ignored the evidence long enough.

has anybody figured out where the 2 or 3 monitoring equipment is located?

Uparaj College is in the old town? but where?

ChiangMai I thought I read is at Phuphing palace

Chiang Mai is supposed to be near the provincial complex.

What is the setup at CMU which is west of the computer science buildings?

Data is worthwhile if its representative. In the US for example they actually put the monitoring equipment where the pollution is bad and not trying to avoid it.

Let's dig a little more into the data collection quality and obvious shortfalls like ignoring PM<2.5 and cancer causing pollutants like benzene(from petrol stations) which aren't even monitored in CM.

Locations:

Uparaj College (also spelt Yupparaj) is on the corner of Rajvitthi and Ratchapakhinai (pardon the spelling) streets in the old town, i.e. a few hundred metres west of the UN Irish Pub. This is one of the few roadside measurement locations in Thailand.

Chiangmai is a mobile system (mounted in a bus, see picture below) and does move around. My impression is that whenever there's royalty visiting the Phuping palace, the bus is stationed there. At other times it appears to be used for various special measurements/projects in other locations.

Chiang Mai is located in the vicinity of "City Hall", i.e. the "provincial complex".

As for other pollutants, like benzene, there is a project "Project for Development of Environmental and Emission Standards of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) in the Kingdom of Thailand" ( http://www.pcd.go.th/info_serv/en_air_seminarVOC08.html ) that will hopefully result not only in standards, but also in a measuring system for these contaminants.

/ Priceless

Edited August 7, 2009 by Priceless