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From Living Now Magazine May/June edition 2000. The Mobile Phone Question.
Building Materials according to Building BiologyIn Building Biology we rate building materials according to their effect on the building internal environment, as well as the effect that the materials production, availability and use has on the external environment as a whole.
When you are choosing any material to be used within a building, the material must be assessed as to its impact on both environments.
Building materials influence almost all interior climate factors including air and surface temperatures; horizontal and vertical gradual temperature differences; building material and air moisture content, air movement and natural ventilation.
Because of this we should be sourcing and using the materials that do the best for our living environment and minimising those that contribute to the building problems. Natural occurring materials are more beneficial to the creation of a healthy home than synthetic, energy inefficient ones. They are also more sustainable, durable, and with a smaller environmental footprint. This makes them more cost effective in the long term.
Avoid using toxic materials, natural and otherwise, that might contribute to health or environmental hazards during their manufacture and construction can help ensure that the occupants of the building should have less health concerns.
Some of the principals of Building Biology also work to address the issues of our global environmental health:
* By using natural and local materials that are renewable and low in embodied energy;
* using energy efficient materials and building systems;
* avoiding materials whose production exploits other human beings or the environment;
* and employing solar energy concepts and radiant heat sources.
By following these principles, by minimising the use of scarce, non-renewable resources and avoiding adding to the environmental pollution of the world by using alternative, renewable energy sources and solar designs to the greatest possible extent will encourage the creation of buildings that contribute to good health and a planet still fit to live on.
These ideas are becoming increasingly common today as people begin to exercise their consumer rights and look for quality 'green' materials that will give them a smaller environmental footprint and at the same time, a 'healthy' home and workplace.
More and more companies and individuals are working on ways to create better and greener building materials and the educated consumer has become more aware of the benefits in purchasing quality healthy green products.
At Building Biology Australia we have healthy green product contact details for just about every commonly used building material found in today's constructions and the range is growing daily. Are they worth the cost? The cost of constructing a healthy energy efficient as well as environmentally friendly building has begun falling to the expected re-sale value. This is directly linked to the growing number of informed people who have decided to invest in quality healthy buildings built with 'Green' credentials not only for the environment that we all live in, but also to improve their own interior environment to produce improved productivity levels and general wellbeing.
Is it worth the cost? From the residential homeowner to the office building both small and large, healthy green buildings are starting to show good financial returns for the investment. Of course the health savings, the increased productivity and sense of well being from living in a Building Biology type healthy house is priceless.
Two of the buildings that Building Biology Australia has been involved with are Australia's First Healthy School at Woodend in Victoria and the First Building Biology inspired Residence belonging to Healthy Buildings Australia in Dromana, Victoria.
Both are good examples of how new buildings can function in a healthy as well as an environmentally friendly way. The biggest project in new construction design and materials consultation undertaken by Building Biology Australia so far was a 2,000m2 two storey office building plus an attached 8,000m2 warehouse with a clean room assembly area, built in Epping, Victoria. This building, although developer owned and constructed, is a good example of how by using Building Biology concepts in the creation of a workplace one can have a building that in many ways can be healthier than the homes the staff live in.
All of these three buildings have used healthy green building materials, and by adding good air exchange and natural light amongst other Building Biology principles, have all managed to produce an extremely high indoor air quality and living / working environment. The Healthy Buildings Australia residence followed every one of the Building Biology principles in is creation, which is why it is an Australian First of its kind.
The value of healthy green materials to a healthy building is huge.
Truly healthy green building materials and proper design concepts can make creating a healthy building not only for the occupants, but also for the world we all share, one of the best things we can do in our lives. This is what we learn in the study of Building Biology
From renovation to new construction, both residential to commercial, Building Biology can provide advice and recommendations to assist in all aspects relating to the creation of healthy buildings.
Daryl Reeves
2007. (C) Building Biology Australia.
What are the Differences between Building Biology & Healthy House concepts?"Healthy Homes. Homes built following a set of principles proposed by the philosophy of Baubiologie. These principles include building homes with materials that don't emit toxic substances, using natural building materials, eliminating use of materials that emit radiation, and minimizing electromagnetic fields. These building practises have been popular in Europe for many years, but are just beginning to gain popularity in the U.S.".
The most commonly found healthy buildings constructed today tend to be mainly concerned with creating a well sealed building with a mechanically controlled indoor air mass to provide a filtered, humidity modified and temperature controlled air to the building interior. Other aspects of "healthy" buildings have been further developed over recent times to include considering the toxic chemical off gassing from the materials used in building construction and finishing, using energy and water efficient appliances, and waste minimisation to a degree. But the main concept remains - sealing the building off from the exterior environment, and creating a mechanically controlled indoor air quality.
Building Biology (or Baubiologie in German), as the opening quote indicates, considers other characteristics of what makes a healthy building as well as the now commonly known concerns regarding indoor air quality.
Using 25 main principles and a number of design, construction and material guidelines, Building Biology considers and covers all possible aspects of the interaction between each building and the occupants as well as the interaction between the building and the environment it is constructed in. These range from the impact a building site will have on the proposed building through light and noise concerns, natural or passive heating and cooling, the toxicity levels, sustainability, embodied energy and durability of the materials used in the buildings' construction and finishing, the provision of low energy ventilation and air exchange to provide a suitable healthy indoor air quality, improving the quality of drinking water and reducing general water and energy consumption, the use of harmonic proportions and colour to enhance the occupants' sense of wellbeing, all building associated waste minimisation and management, to the potential health impacts of natural and technical electromagnetic fields and radiation.
This is no more than a summary of how much Building Biology differs from the other "healthy" building philosophy's and guidelines but it serves to indicate the depth of the study Building Biology uses in reducing the impact to health that our buildings or 'built environment' can have on our health and wellbeing.
'Healthy' Buildings are a good step in the right direction to improve our built environment, but Building Biology is still the only and oldest way to ensure that the buildings you live and work in have the least potential adverse impact on your health.
Daryl Reeves
2007. (C) Building Biology Australia.
Dashefsky, H. Steven. 1993. Environmental Literacy. The A to Z Guide. Random House, New York.
The Mobile Phone Question.
From Living Now Magazine May/June edition 2000There has been a lot of interest in the media recently concerning the whole Mobile Phone issue, particularly the question as to whether or not using a hands free kit creates a greater risk than not using one.This question like so many about our current use of technology will not have any simple answer due to the distance between modern technology and medical and scientific research.
Yes it is true. Our science and technology is sadly way behind the industries that are exploiting every opportunity to increase their profit margins regardless of the future health impact of their products.
We the public or consumers as all industries prefer to see us, have little information or support from the sellers of the technology apart from vague assurances that there is nothing to worry about.
Our governments have vested interests in the involved industries particularly in this country. These concern the profit margins and stock market stability that come from a strong commodity turn over and profit margins.Consequently our governments and the regulatory and other associated authorities have little interest as yet, in ensuring that industries will develop technologies that are not only safe to use, but could also be seen as the worlds best.
So just what is all the fuss about and why don't we seem to be able to understand whether or not mobile phone emissions may have the potential to cause harm or not, and specifically whether or not the use of a hands free kit reduces the potential for harm.
Much of the confusion comes from our inability to properly study the effects from this previously little used part of the Electromagnetic Spectrum.
We are all now familiar with the microwave oven. Yet only recently it to was a new invention as far as it's general use was concerned. Now we have the mobile phone, so brand new in our lives that most people know when they saw their first one. In fact there is still a majority of the worlds population that know nothing about them.There may be some 300 million mobile phone users in the world but that doesn't mean the technology is safe or even that the majority of the developed world population uses them.
In the U.S it has been estimated that only some 30% of the population use mobile phones. This is hardly the indication we are sold in the advertisements and other forms of media including the entertainment industry.
It is of little value to tell us that this sort of technology has been around for 50 or even 100 years, when it has not been in general something that we have had in our homes for any real period of time. Nor have the potential effects been studied for that long. If this were the case we would have no problem finding the research to prove that microwave emissions of the type used for telecommunications are indeed safe.
Instead what we seem to have is a body of conflicting research findings that do nothing to help us - the consumer - to make an informed decision as to what our families and we are being exposed to.
Many eminent and other researchers, scientists and regulatory officials have come forward to express their concerns about the way the telecommunications industries and governing bodies are handling this issue. Some have been prominent in supporting previous claims made that the microwave frequency and strength from mobile phones could not possibly have any biological adverse effects on the human body. That was until they actually got more involved in the research and found either discrepancies that worried them, or that they found they were being "hobbled" by the vested interests involved.
One such prominent industry researcher Dr George L. Carlo Ph.D, M.S., J.D, who at the time was the Chairman of the Wireless Technology Research LLC, was often called upon to be the expert to tell us that everything was ok, and that the concerns raised by some people were to be considered to be at best alarmist and should not be considered seriously. That was until he wrote a letter to Mr. C. Michael Armstrong the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of AT & T Corporation dated 7 October 1999
Amongst other things he said -
* The rate of death from brain cancer among handheld phone users was higher than the rate of brain cancer death among those who used non-handheld phones that were away from their head;
* The risk of acoustic neuroma, a benign tumour of the auditory nerve that is well in range of the radiation coming from a phone's antenna, was fifty percent higher in people who reported using cell phones for six years or more, moreover, that relationship between the amount of cell phone use and this tumour appeared to follow a dose-response curve: (meaning the more the phone was used the higher the risk)
* The risk of rare neuro epithelial tumours on the outside of the brain was more than doubled, a statistically significant risk increase, in cell phone users as compared to people who did not use cell phones;
* There appeared to be some correlation between brain tumours occurring on the right side of the head and the use of the phone on the right side of the head;
* Laboratory studies looking at the ability of radiation from a phone's antenna to cause functional genetic damage were definitively positive, and were following a dose-response relationship.
"Alarmingly, indications are that some segments of the industry have ignored the scientific findings suggesting potential health effects, have repeatedly and falsely claimed that wireless phones are safe for all consumers including children, and have created an illusion of responsible follow up by calling for and supporting more research. The most important measures of consumer protection are missing: complete and honest factual information to allow informed judgement by consumers about assumption of risk; the direct tracking and monitoring of what happens to consumers who use wireless phones; and, the monitoring of changes in the technology that could impact health."
Dr George Carlos letter to Mr. C. Michael Armstrong.
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of AT & T Corporation. 7 October 1999
Another ex industry researcher, Dr William Ross Adey, a former senior NASA advisor, had his funding withdrawn by Motorola before he was able to complete his research that was indicating the potential for mobile phone frequencies to affect brain tumours in animals 1993 - 1996.
"The animal experiments were conducted very strictly and in the case of digital phones we found an effect on the number of brain tumours in rats".
"It became clear that motorola preferred we found nothing".
"During our funding there was constant discussion about the wording of abstract and papers".
"Basically the industry is not really interested in diligent pursuit of scientific evidence which should be available to the public. All they want is research that supports their claims".
U.K "Express Newspapers" May 1999.
A team of researchers (Leif Salford, Arne Brun and Bertil Persson) at the University of Lund in Sweden have shown that the protein albumin leaks through the Blood Brain Barrier of rats exposed to microwaves corresponding to those produced by a mobile phone. They have also shown that lower levels [of microwave energy] are more efficient: one ten thousandth to one thousandth of a Watt is sufficient to generate albumin leakage
"Radiation from the base stations of the mobile phone systems should therefore be enough to affect the brain. Even someone who is in the vicinity of a person making a call may be influenced by the radiation from the phone." Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet Sept 1999.
The Swedish experiments show mobile phone use could lead to an increased risk of multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases through the blood protein leakage into the brain.
The Russians have studied the effects of differing EMR strengths and their effects for many years, and since 1958 have had an occupational microwave standard of .01 mW/cm2.
This is considered to be the maximum daily limit for exposed Russian workers.
The public's radiation exposure limit was .001 mW/cm2.
In contrast, the U.S. public's radiation exposure limit under the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) standards of August 1996 is 1 mW/cm2. Between 100 and 1,000 times higher!!
The difference between the 1958 Russian radiation standards and the U.S. standards was explained by one Russian researcher as simply that the U.S. standards were solely based on protection from the thermal (heating) effect, ignoring non-thermal effects. As a result, the western telecommunications industries are were unable to set up in Russia for a long time.
Other countries have tried to halt the expansion of the telecommunication industries from saturating their country with microwave radiation until they know for sure as to the potential for adverse health effects.
The U.S have threatened to take a number of these countries to the World Trade Organizations court system for being concerned about the safety of their citizens.
Three of these countries - Canada, Japan, Mexico face massive fines and trade restrictions unless they agree to allow the U.S telecommunications industries to have unrestricted access.
The current standards around most of the world are based on the thermal heating effects of microwave radiation. In other words, if the emissions don't cause any obvious sense of heating [by raising the internal body temperature by 1oC, then it can be claimed that there are no adverse health effects. This is ignoring the large amount of research that indicates biological effects without temperature increase or non-thermal effects.
See what I mean when I say that the medical research and knowledge is years behind the technology? When a government official, industry spokesperson, or any one else for that matter claim that there can be no adverse health effect based on current medical and scientific "substantiated evidence", they are not lying. But they are also not being honest about the potential dangers that are being discovered.
So what are these thermal standards (the only ones we have to protect us), what are they based on and so on. The current standards in Australia are interim standards - the debate is going on as to what they should be. The current standards also only apply to the emissions from the mobile phone towers and not to the phones themselves. Currently this whole situation is under review and your guess is as good as mine as to the eventual outcome, except to say that the standards will definitely favour the telecommunications industry and not the consumer.
The amount of microwave energy that we could be exposed to from mobile phones and other microwave transmitters is calculated as the Specific Absorption Rate or S.A.R. About 60% of that microwave energy produced by mobile phones is actually absorbed by the users head. This energy seems to penetrate about 3 to 5cm before the energy dissipates.S.A.R's of the brand name mobile phones vary somewhat and some people like to try to use only low SAR phones. Research in Sweden has indicated that Electrically Sensitive people actually seem to have more trouble with some of the lower rated phones. This is likely because of the higher Magnetic Fields that these phones tend to produce.
The SAR can be used as an indication of the amount of induced current able to be produced in the human body from the amount of energy absorbed. It is often pointed out that the rates are only an indicator of the potential energy absorption by adults. This raises the question about allowing children and young teenagers to use the phones as they could be absorbing a higher rate of energy than adults.
Researchers believe that this current can directly affect cells and the central nervous system and the activity of important enzymes and neurotransmitters.
"There is strong evidence that extreme low frequency (ELF) and radio frequency microwaves (RF/MW) are associated with accelerated aging (enhanced cell death and cancer) and moods, depression, suicide, anger, rage and violence, primarily through alteration of cellular calcium ions and the melatonin/serotonin balance."Dr. Neil Cherry, Lincoln University, New Zealand from his June 1998 report,
Actual or potential effects of ELF and RF/MW radiation on accelerating aging of human, animal or plant cells. "If the radiation is not sufficiently energetic to break chemical bonds or sufficiently intense to heat tissues to the point of damage, how can it possibly hurt you?"
"What we do have, however, are some tantalizing results suggesting that cellphones' emissions have a variety of strange effects on living tissue that can't be reconciled with conventional radiation biology. And it's only when the questions raised by these experiments are answered that we'll be able to say for sure what mobiles might be doing to your head". New Scientist, April 1999
Some models of mobile phone have a retractable antenna, which can be raised; some have no outward appearance of an antenna at all. It should be noted that the whole length of the phone acts as an antenna, and not just that little bump on top.Because the whole phone can be a source of microwave energy emission it becomes obvious that the further away from you it can be the better, hence the popularity of the hand-free kit.
A hand-free kit helps to keep your head away from the phone while using it and so helps to reduce the amount of absorbed energy. But don't use the phone in a pocket or on your belt anywhere near your liver, kidneys, and other internal organs. This is because the amount of absorbed energy potential is increased in this region due to the absence of bone tissue, which reduces the depth of energy penetration.
You should also not consider leaving the phone turned on while it is attached to your belt or in a pocket. This is because the phone is sending an intermittent signal to the nearest tower so that if and when the phone needs to be used the required energy out put will ensure your connection. By keeping the phone in your pocket or bag, it has to produce enough energy to penetrate the material so as to get the signal connection to reach the tower.The only way to protect the user from this is to shield the entire phone.
This is something the manufacturers should have automatically done, but in the pursuit of maximum profits at minimum cost there no doubt seemed to be little reason to protect the consumer from something that our governments do not consider to exist. Beware though of some of the shielding products available on the market - demand to see them demonstrated using measurable {instrumentation] methods and do not rely on the fast sales pitch.
The same holds true when these phones are used inside a building and more particularly a vehicle.
The vehicle in particular is a metal box, somewhat like a microwave oven although the energy produced by the phone is not as high as the energy produced by a microwave oven, it is still the same type, and so your car becomes a low energy microwave oven. Here again a hand-free kit coupled to an external antenna will reduce your exposure and that of everyone else in the vehicle.
The recent reports in the media concerning the potential for hand-free kits to contribute to the brains' absorption of microwave energy border on the ludicrous -
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When the same media refuse to acknowledge the hundreds of research papers indicating adverse health effect potential from the current microwave communications systems.
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When our own country has the chance to create a new Standard for Electro-Magnetic Emissions that could be in line with worlds best practices.
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And when our health and that of our children is at risk from exposure levels that are consistently being shown to cast doubts over the medical and scientific assumptions from the last century.
Yes it is time they considered the future as being more than seeing in the year 2000, and start now to consider our health and survival on this abused and battered planet. Surely it is a better approach to considered reducing your use of this new technology, and taking precautionary measures like hand-free kits and shielding that has a measurable effect until we all get some definitive answers, and that will take years. By then we will very likely be facing a similar situation as has been found in the past namely - DDT, asbestos, lead.
All of which were considered safe based on the research knowledge of the times.
All of which made millions of dollars for the industries involved.
All of which warnings about their potential for health effects were given years in advance.
And all of which cost us the consumer, potential health problems then, now and in the future, and millions of dollars to clean up, in legal court cases, law suits and compensation.
Do we have to go through this whole process again?
From the "Precautionary Principle" -
"When an activity raises threats of harm to human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not fully established scientifically. In this context the proponent of an activity, rather than the public, should bear the burden of proof".
Daryl Reeves
(C) Building Biology Australia
May/June 2000.
