Review of the Air Quality Criteria Document for Particulate Matter

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Table 6-23 Respiratory Sx, lung function and biomarker effects.. What biomarkers areinvestigated? I didn’t find any. Table 6-22 (asthmatic subjects) is entitled just Sx and lungfunction.6-216 6.4.1 This section appears to belong in ch 9??5-225-227 Is it commonly accepted that SO2 cannot be a confounder for PM???5-226 Discussion of the use of factor analysis is a good addition.5-238 Mention of the Lipsett (1997) study is an opportunity to mention the role of wwod smokeas a constituent of PM. This should have been emphasized. In general there is notenough use of the role of geographical differences in PM composition as a means ofunderstanding the toxic components.5-246 Discussion of thresholds. If individual responses to PM prevent establishment of athreshold, how does that fit with the language of the CAA that requires setting a NAAQSfor the most sensitive members of society??5-266 6.5 Conclusions# 2. Would it be more useful to describe heterogeneity as geographic differences in thecomposition of PM?#3 I think short term v long term exposures need to be considered very, very carefully. We donot know to what extent prior exposure to air pollution is involved in the premature death casesin the short-term time series studies.#4 The CF data may be telling us that there are geographic differences in PM#5 This conclusion highlights effects during early pregnancy and post-natal periods. Howeverthese data are not presented forcefully in the prior text of the CD.#9 As I mentioned earlier, I suggest a systematic description and summary of effects of copollutants.#12 this paragraph (or a separate one) could include a discussion of the fact that there are likelydifferent mechanisms for different PM-induced health effects. For instance, the mechanismsunderlying air pollution aggravation of asthma will be entirely different from those underlyingdeath from congestive heart failure.#13 Should this paragraph be merged with # 4?Comparison with the November 1999 draft CD1) CASAC deemed that draft to be too encyclopedic and yet I don’t see that the currentdraft is any less so.2) CASAC recommended emphasis on cardiovascular effects and on infant mortality. Iexpected to see a separate table for these outcomes—certainly for infant mortality asthere are only a few studies.3) Is there really any more risk assessment in this draft than in the 1999 draft?4) I believe that the strategy used to select the articles cited in the CD is still lacking inspite of a specific request following the last meeting of CASAC.A - 51
Chapter 5. Human Exposure to PM and its ConstituentsI am not by any means an expert in the filed of exposure assessment. That said here aremy impressions on this chapter.My overall impression of this chapter is that it is very different in scope from chapter 6and 8. The emphasis appears to be a description of models available for describing exposure.As with chapter 6, this chapter would benefit greatly from a short paragraph at the beginningdescribing the goals and intent of the chapter. As with Ch 6 I am disturbed that the data onwood smoke have not be considered. The indoor/outdoor studies of fine PM from wood smokemay offer some useful information on penetration of PM indoors.Another impression is that the chapter listed individual papers published since 1996 butdid not compare and contrast these studies.Specific comments4-1 The second sentence should state that the lung AND HEART are the targets of concern.4-4 Is the nomenclature µe accepted in the field. I don’t like it—micro environments havenothing to due with scientific measures of micrometers etc.at)In all figures the authors need to be very clear not are measured data and what arededuced from the models.Should there be some description of exposure assessment to co-pollutants?Executive Summary:This has not yet been provided by EPA.Introduction:Petros Koutrakis, PhDThe introduction is very informative and concise. I agree with the approach to build upon therecent 1996 Criteria Document, which made it possible to focus on recent information.Considering that the number of publications on particle exposures and effects has increasedexponentially over the last few years, I was afraid that the new Criteria Document would belarger than the yellow pages. I am very pleased to see that this is not the case and the EPA staffhave provided, for most of the Document, a critical review of the existing information ratherthan merely a catalogue of papers. It is clear that the particle health effects field hassignificantly matured and that the continuing interactions between EPA and the researchcommunity have helped to build a scientific consensus. This is very gratifying and will enableus to address this serious public health issue in a cost effective way.Chapter 2: Physics, Chemistry, and Measurement of Particulate MatterOverall, this chapter is very well written. As indicated in my previous review, I had only a fewcomments which now have been addressed by the authors. In addition, the authors havereferenced many recent papers relevant to this chapter.To obtain organic carbon total mass concentration it is necessary to multiple the carbonconcentration (detected as OC) by 1.4. This conversion factor corresponds to an averagemolecular weight ratio of ambient air organic compounds to carbon. Because this conversionfactor can depend on aerosol composition, which can vary by time and location, there may beA - 52
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Review of the Air Quality Criteria Document for Particulate Matter

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