The smell of a new car is usually pleasant and we generally do not ask ourselves what its origin is, that is, what substances generate the aroma that we perceive when we open a vehicle, but it seems that it could be harmful to health because a study has revealed that this “new author smell” comes from chemicals that are released into the air by the materials used to make cars, a process known as degassing, and that previous research has suggested that some of them –such as formaldehyde–, They can constitute a danger for the drivers of the car.
This conclusion has been reached by a team of mechanical and civil engineers working with occupational health scientists affiliated with various entities in China and two colleagues from Harvard University after analyzing a wide variety of chemicals present in the interior of a newly purchased SUV, as well as air samples inside the vehicle for several days. Their findings have been published in Cell Reports Physical Science.
Investigators analyzed chemicals that had been released inside a new mid-size plug-in hybrid SUV. What they did was park the vehicle in a local outdoor parking lot and test the air inside the cabin daily for 12 consecutive days.
Inside the car the amounts of some chemicals, such as acetaldehyde, a known carcinogen, exceeded safety standards by 61%
During the study the environmental conditions changed, especially the air temperature, which went from 21ºC to 63ºC. They used gas chromatography and mass spectrometry to identify chemicals in air samples and what concentrations they were in, allowing them to identify 20 chemicals in the air samples that came from the components that had been used to build the vehicle.
Formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, benzene and heat: a very harmful ‘cocktail’
The amounts detected varied, mostly based on the temperatures of the surfaces inside the car (not the air temperatures). They found that the amounts of some chemicals, such as formaldehyde, exceeded Chinese government safety standards by as much as 35%. Acetaldehyde, a known carcinogen, exceeded standards by 61%. The team also found levels of benzene considered unsafe for drivers to inhale during long drives.
It is known that there is a positive correlation between this type of substance and heat and that the higher the temperature of the surfaces inside the vehicle, the more the carcinogenic potential of the substances that give off this odor increases, so it is essential to avoid leave the car in the sun whenever possible, and open the windows to circulate the air and ventilate inside each time we sit in the vehicle. The authors of the work, in fact, suggest that people who have purchased a new car travel with the windows down.
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