Hey everyone, and welcome back to My Weird Prompts. I am Corn, and I am sitting here on our balcony in Jerusalem, looking out over the hills. It is actually a relatively clear day today, but that is not always the case.
It definitely is not. I am Herman Poppleberry, and I have spent the last few hours diving into the data Daniel sent over. Our housemate Daniel has been tracking air quality for a year now, and his findings are honestly a bit sobering. He noticed that the air quality here in Israel, particularly in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, is consistently worse than what you see in cities like London, New York, or even Cork in Ireland.
It is a striking comparison. When you think of London, you often think of the historical pea-souper fogs or the modern congestion, but the data suggests we are actually breathing in more particulate matter here on a regular basis. Daniel was asking why this is the case, especially since Israel is a highly developed, high-tech economy. You would think we would have this under control.
You would think so, but it is a complex mix of geography, meteorology, and urban planning. Or, in some cases, a lack of urban planning. We have actually touched on related issues before, like in episode three hundred and twenty when we talked about indoor air quality and mold, and episode three hundred and ninety-eight where we looked at the rental market and respiratory hazards. But today, we are going outside. We are talking about the very air that fills our lungs every time we step out the front door.
So let us start with the big picture. When Daniel looks at his app and sees an air quality index of sixty or seventy in Tel Aviv, while London is sitting at twenty-five, what are we actually looking at? What are the primary pollutants we are dealing with here?
The main culprit we talk about in Israel is particulate matter, specifically P-M two point five and P-M ten. These are tiny particles, two point five micrometers or ten micrometers in diameter. To give you an idea, a human hair is about seventy micrometers wide. So these things are incredibly small. P-M two point five is particularly nasty because it is small enough to travel deep into the lungs and even enter the bloodstream.
And Daniel mentioned he is an asthmatic, so he is feeling this more acutely than most. But even for those of us without underlying conditions, the long-term exposure is a serious health risk. Why is the concentration so much higher here? Is it just because we have a lot of cars?
Cars are a huge part of it, but before we blame the traffic, we have to look at the dust. We live in a region surrounded by deserts. We have the Sahara to our west and the Arabian Desert to our east. During certain times of the year, especially in the spring and autumn, we get these weather patterns called the Sharav or Khamsin. These are hot, dry winds that carry massive amounts of mineral dust.
Right, I remember those days. The sky turns this eerie yellowish-orange color, and you can literally feel the grit in your teeth if you walk outside. But that is a natural phenomenon. Is that the primary reason the average is higher, or is there a baseline level of human-made pollution that is also worse?
It is both. The natural dust gives us a higher baseline of P-M ten, but the human-made stuff, the P-M two point five from vehicle emissions and industry, is where the real danger lies. Israel has one of the highest vehicle densities in the developed world. Not necessarily the most cars per person, but the most cars per kilometer of road. Our roads are incredibly congested, and because our population is concentrated in a very small geographic area, mainly the coastal plain and the Jerusalem corridor, all that exhaust is concentrated too.
That is an interesting distinction. The density of the cars on the actual road surface. And when you combine that with our topography, it gets even worse, right? I know Tel Aviv has issues with humidity trapping pollutants, and here in Jerusalem, we are in a bowl surrounded by mountains.
Exactly. We often experience something called a temperature inversion. Normally, air gets cooler as you go higher up. But sometimes, a layer of warm air sits on top of a layer of cooler air near the ground. This acts like a lid on a pot, trapping all the car exhaust, construction dust, and industrial emissions right where we are breathing. In Tel Aviv, the high humidity also plays a role. Moisture can bond with pollutants like nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide, creating a sort of chemical soup that just hangs in the air.
It is frustrating because when you look at a city like London, they have been very aggressive about this. They have the Ultra Low Emission Zone, or U-L-E-Z, which charges older, more polluting vehicles to enter the city. They have pivoted heavily toward electric buses and cycling infrastructure. Why does it feel like we are lagging so far behind?
Well, we do have a Clean Air Act. It was passed in two thousand and eight and went into effect in two thousand and eleven. It gave the Ministry of Environmental Protection a lot of power to regulate industry and vehicles. And to be fair, we have seen some improvements. We moved our power plants from coal to natural gas, which significantly reduced sulfur dioxide emissions. But the transport sector is the white whale. Our public transit system, while improving with the new light rail lines in Tel Aviv and the expansion here in Jerusalem, is still decades behind European standards.
And that is the crux of it, isn't it? If the public transit is not reliable or extensive enough, people stick to their cars. And more cars mean more P-M two point five. I also wonder about construction. It feels like every second street in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv is a construction site.
It practically is. Israel is growing incredibly fast. That construction creates a lot of coarse dust, which contributes to those P-M ten levels. But it also means more heavy trucks on the road, which are often older diesel vehicles that spew out fine particulates. If you compare that to a city like Cork, which Daniel mentioned, you have a much smaller population, less construction density, and a coastal breeze that is much more effective at clearing out pollutants than the Mediterranean breeze is for us.
So, we have geography working against us with the desert dust and inversions, and we have policy working against us with high vehicle density and slow public transit growth. Daniel also asked what can be done to put pressure on the government to act. This feels like one of those issues where everyone agrees it is bad, but nothing moves fast enough.
It requires a multi-pronged approach. First, there is the legal route. Organizations like Adam Teva V'Din, which is the Israel Union for Environmental Defense, do incredible work. They use the Clean Air Act to sue the government and large polluters when they fail to meet standards. Supporting these N-G-Os is one of the most effective ways to exert pressure.
What about data transparency? Daniel is looking at these apps, but how much of that data is actually coming from official sources, and how much is being used to hold officials accountable?
That is a great point. The Ministry of Environmental Protection operates a network of monitoring stations. You can actually go to their website and see real-time data. But the problem is the density of those stations. They might have one station for an entire neighborhood. Pollution can vary significantly from one street to the next, especially if one street is a major bus artery and the other is a quiet side street. This is where the community science aspect comes in, which Daniel also asked about.
Right, he mentioned that contributing to these networks often requires buying expensive equipment. He saw sensors that cost four hundred dollars, which is a lot of money. Are there cheaper ways for people to get involved?
There absolutely are. The four hundred dollar price tag usually refers to high-end, pre-assembled outdoor units like the PurpleAir sensors. Those are fantastic because they are very accurate and they automatically upload data to a global map. But if you are willing to get a little bit technical, you can build your own for a fraction of that cost.
Now you are speaking Herman's language. Tell me about the D-I-Y approach.
There is a project called Luftdaten, which started in Germany. It is now part of a larger initiative called Sensor dot Community. They provide instructions on how to build a sensor using off-the-shelf components. You need a small microcontroller, like an E-S-P eighty-two sixty-six, which costs about five or ten dollars. Then you need a particulate matter sensor, like the S-D-S zero eleven, which is about twenty to thirty dollars. Add a temperature and humidity sensor for another five dollars, some plastic piping to keep it dry, and you have a functional, high-quality air monitor for under fifty dollars.
Under fifty dollars sounds much more manageable than four hundred. But how hard is it to put together? Do you need to be an electrical engineer?
Not at all. There is no soldering required if you use jumper wires. It is basically like building a Lego set for electronics. You plug the wires into the right pins, flash the firmware onto the controller using a U-S-B cable, and it connects to your home Wi-Fi. It then sends data every few minutes to the global map.
That is incredible. And if we had hundreds of these scattered across Jerusalem instead of just a handful of government stations, we would have a much clearer picture of where the hotspots are.
Exactly. And that data is powerful. Imagine being able to go to a city council meeting and saying, look, here is the data from twenty different sensors along this specific street. The P-M two point five levels are consistently three times higher than the World Health Organization guidelines. That is much harder for a politician to ignore than a general complaint about the air feeling dusty.
It is about creating a localized evidence base. We actually talked about the enforcement gap in episode one hundred and fifteen when we discussed tobacco policy. It is one thing to have a law on the books, but it is another thing entirely to have the data and the public pressure to ensure that law is actually being enforced.
That is a perfect parallel. The Clean Air Act has the teeth, but the government often lacks the political will to bite, especially when it comes to restricting car use or imposing heavy fines on industrial zones like the one in Haifa. The Haifa Bay area is a notorious example. It is a massive industrial hub right next to a major population center. Residents there have been fighting for years to close down the oil refineries because of the documented health impacts.
And that brings us back to what people can do. Beyond building sensors, what are the policy changes we should be shouting for? If we want to catch up to London or New York, what are the big wins?
Low Emission Zones are the low-hanging fruit. Jerusalem has actually started a small Low Emission Zone in the city center, but it is very limited in scope. We need to expand those zones to cover entire metropolitan areas and make the standards much stricter. We also need to talk about the scrap-page programs. In many countries, the government will pay you to trade in your old, polluting diesel car for an electric one or for a public transit pass. We have had small versions of this in Israel, but they are often underfunded and poorly publicized.
It also feels like we need a massive cultural shift in how we view transportation. We are so car-dependent here. Part of that is the geography and the lack of trains, but part of it is also status and convenience.
It is, but convenience is a product of infrastructure. If you look at Tel Aviv right now, the construction of the light rail is a nightmare, but once that entire network is finished, the calculation for a commuter changes. If you can get from Petah Tikva to the center of Tel Aviv in twenty minutes on a train versus an hour in traffic, people will switch. The pressure needs to be on accelerating those projects. We cannot have a light rail line take twenty years to complete.
And in the meantime, what can an individual do to protect themselves? Daniel is an asthmatic, he is tracking the data, he is seeing the bad numbers. Besides staying indoors with the windows shut, what are the practical takeaways?
Well, as we discussed in episode three hundred and twenty, a high-quality H-E-P-A filter in your home can make a massive difference. It can strip out those P-M two point five particles that leak in from outside. But for being outdoors, it is about timing. Pollution levels usually peak during the morning and evening rush hours. If you are going for a run or taking the kids to the park, trying to avoid those windows can significantly reduce your exposure.
Also, the location within the city matters. Even a block or two away from a major road, the concentration of particulates drops off significantly. If you have the option to walk through a residential neighborhood rather than along a main artery, take it.
Definitely. And use the apps. Daniel mentioned AirVisual, which is great. There is also BreezoMeter, which was actually an Israeli startup that Google acquired. They use sophisticated algorithms to give you street-level air quality data. If you see the numbers are in the red, that is the day to skip the outdoor workout or wear a mask if you have to be near traffic.
It is funny you mention the masks. We all got used to them during the pandemic, and for a while, people were realizing that an N-ninety-five mask is actually very effective at filtering out air pollution too. In cities like Seoul or Beijing, it is completely normal to see people wearing masks on high-pollution days. We haven't quite adopted that culture here yet.
No, we haven't, but maybe we should. Especially for vulnerable populations. But I want to go back to Daniel's point about the government. One of the most powerful things you can do is participate in the public comment periods for new infrastructure projects. When a new highway is proposed or a new power plant is being discussed, there is a legal requirement for public consultation. Often, only the lobbyists show up. If hundreds of citizens show up with air quality data and health concerns, it changes the conversation.
It is about showing that there is a political cost to ignoring the air we breathe. I think people often feel powerless against something as abstract as air quality, but it is actually very local. It is the bus idling at the corner of your street. It is the construction site next door that isn't using water to suppress dust. These are things you can report to the municipal authorities.
Right. Most municipalities have a hotline, the one-zero-six number here in Israel. If you see a truck spewing black smoke or a construction site creating a dust cloud, call it in. The more reports they get, the more they are forced to send inspectors out. It is about being a nuisance for the sake of public health.
I like that. Being a nuisance for public health. It is also worth mentioning that Israel is a signatory to various international climate and environmental agreements. We are supposed to be reducing our carbon footprint, and a lot of the actions that reduce carbon also reduce local air pollution. Switching to electric vehicles, for example, solves two problems at once.
It does, but we have to be careful about where the electricity comes from. If we all switch to electric cars but we are still burning gas or coal to generate that electricity, we are just moving the pollution from the tailpipe to the smokestack. Luckily, Israel is making strides in solar, though again, not as fast as we could be given how much sun we have.
It is the classic Israeli paradox. We have the technology, we have the sunshine, we have the smart people like Daniel who are tracking the data, but the implementation is often bogged down in bureaucracy and short-term thinking.
Exactly. But I am hopeful. The fact that people like Daniel are even paying attention to this is a huge shift. Twenty years ago, nobody in Israel knew what A-Q-I stood for. Now, it is a standard feature on weather apps. That awareness is the first step toward change.
So, to summarize for Daniel and for everyone else listening. Why is the air quality worse here? It is a combination of natural desert dust, high vehicle density on a limited road network, and geographic features that trap pollution. What can be done? Support environmental N-G-Os, use the legal system, pressure local government for better public transit and Low Emission Zones, and report local violations.
And if you want to contribute to the data, do not feel like you have to spend four hundred dollars. Go to Sensor dot Community, look up the Luftdaten instructions, and build your own for fifty bucks. It is a fun weekend project, and it provides real, actionable data that helps everyone breathe a little easier.
I think I might actually build one of those this weekend, Herman. We can stick it out on the balcony and see how our air compares to the official station down the road.
I was hoping you would say that. I already have a spare microcontroller in my desk. We just need to order the sensor.
Perfect. Well, this has been a fascinating deep dive. It is an issue that literally affects every single person living in this region, and yet it doesn't get nearly enough headlines unless there is a massive dust storm.
That is the thing about air pollution. It is often invisible, but its effects are very real. From asthma to cardiovascular disease, the health costs are enormous. Treating it as a public health crisis rather than just an environmental inconvenience is key.
Well said. And hey, if you are enjoying the show and finding these discussions helpful, we would really appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your podcast app or on Spotify. It genuinely helps other people find the show and join the conversation.
It really does. And thank you to Daniel for sending in this prompt. It is something we have been talking about around the dinner table for a while, and it was great to finally dig into the details.
Absolutely. You can find more information about this episode and all our past episodes, including those ones on mold and tobacco policy we mentioned, at our website, myweirdprompts dot com. We have a full archive there and a way for you to get in touch if you have a prompt of your own.
Thanks for listening, everyone. This has been My Weird Prompts.
Until next time, take a deep breath, and maybe check your app first. Bye for now.
Bye everyone.
