[QUOTE 4991664, member: 9609"]the link you give only takes me to a page that gives a very brief abstract to what is a 'pay per view' article. So I guess I'm not seeing what you are seeing?. Is it saying that air filtration in cars does not work ? I am led to believe that pollen filters remove all PM2.5, is that not the case? and even without pollen filters does setting the ventillation to 'recirc' (like I do when i go through the tyne tunnel) not limit how much pollution I am exposed to when driving through a heavily polluted enviroment. I reckon if you cycled through the tyne tunnel you would cough for an entire month, in my van with ventilation set to recirc I don't even smell it.[/QUOTE]
Even in re-circulation mode a certain amount of outside air will be mixed in. A car cabin cannot be hermetically sealed, for one thing it would have people passing out from oxygen deprivation if they forgot to switch back to fresh air before they used up all the cabin oxygen...
The issue with car cabin air is that the intakes are generally in exactly the place where the most pollution is found - low down just behind the source of the pollution (the vehicle in front).
Pollen filters do take out the biggest particles, but there are smaller particles it won't touch and neither will it do much about the real worrying pollution (N0x). Worrying because it is difficult to measure and hasn't been included in vehicle excise pricing like CO2 so it appears manufacturers have gamed the system pretty extensively.
NOx is a pretty nasty mixture of pollution although it can be quite short lived - weather conditions often cause it to break down with oxygen and generate ozone - itself a pretty horrid pollutant at ground level. Because of the nature of NOx, proximity is important in the calculation for exposure - sitting right in front of the source is worse than even simply standing a small distance away.
As an aside, in real world testing studies have found that the latest specification HGVs emit less NOx than a standard Euro VI car (latest standard). This is because HGVs are tested in real world conditions and need a whole bunch of scrubbing technology on the exhaust to get through the test. Cars go through a less realistic test cycle and so get passed without the need for all this expensive stuff. The upshot is that studies showed even diesel cars with Euro VI compliance can emit over twice the NOx of a HGV. New regulations will make a bit of a difference, but it is predicted diesel cars still won't catch up, and each new tightening regulation makes diesel more expensive and complicated for car use/