Air high quality in Southern California is dangerously dangerous due to the fires. Our reporter got down to construct an air filter — in a mode the EPA praised, utilizing solely issues she already had at dwelling.
MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
The fires in Los Angeles have spewed smoke over town for days. Air filters in houses may also help, however what if you do not have one? NPR’s Alejandra Borunda covers well being and local weather change, and she or he got down to see if individuals might make filters themselves.
ALEJANDRA BORUNDA, BYLINE: The quick reply is sure. You may construct a DIY air filter in lower than half-hour with stuff that you just in all probability have already got in your home.
ELLIOTT GALL: My identify is Elliott Gall, and I’m an affiliate professor within the division of mechanical and supplies engineering at Portland State College.
BORUNDA: He is the designer of this air filter referred to as The Cocoon. Graduate pupil Brett Stinson explains.
BRETT STINSON: It is fairly easy. It is only a cloth filter. That is cotton batting and a field fan.
BORUNDA: Principally, only a tube of material hooked up to a field fan. Gall says it is an outdated know-how referred to as a baghouse filter.
GALL: And it primarily is a bit of material that you just pressure air by that filters out particulate matter.
BORUNDA: To me, it seems like a blobby, puffy, 8-foot-long sausage. Nevertheless it works virtually in addition to air filters you should buy. Right here within the lab up in Portland, we load up a sealed bedroom-sized space with smoke and begin The Cocoon operating. Inside about 10 or quarter-hour, the air is just about clear. And I stay in Southern California. Proper now, the air is smoky. So this weekend, my accomplice and I got down to construct a Cocoon for ourselves.
That is Ali (ph) and Alex’s (ph) try to make a field fan filter.
Gall despatched me a PDF with directions. First, we monitor down a regular field fan, like those they promote in nearly each ironmongery shop. You then want an enormous piece of material that is 72″ extensive.
This is the measuring tape.
That is vital as a result of that dimension will match neatly on the fan.
(SOUNDBITE OF MEASURING TAPE PULLING AND RETRACTING)
BORUNDA: Gall used cotton batting just like the stuff within quilts.
However we do not have that, clearly. I am not a quilter. What we do have – they usually say is OK – is sheets. Cotton or linen work greatest, they are saying.
We discovered an outdated, full-sized flat sheet at the back of a cupboard. That was good. Greater ones might work, too, however you’d have to chop them down. So then we took the sheet, and we folded it in half lengthwise, like a large sizzling canine bun. After which I hooked up the 2 lengthy sides collectively very rigorously with duct tape.
(SOUNDBITE OF DUCT TAPE PULLING)
BORUNDA: You find yourself with this large, lengthy tube. And then you definately take some rubber bands or hair ties or no matter and twist them round one finish of the tube – such as you’re placing it in slightly ponytail.
(SOUNDBITE OF RUBBER BAND SNAPPING)
ALEX: That works.
BORUNDA: And now we’re on to the final step. We slip the open finish of the material tube across the fringe of the field fan and duct tape it in place.
(SOUNDBITE OF DUCT TAPE PULLING)
BORUNDA: However be sure you do not make this error.
I lined up the controls. In order that’s slightly bit foolish. That was my mistake. Do not try this.
Then we flip it on.
(SOUNDBITE OF FAN WHIRRING)
BORUNDA: Ooh. And we’ve inflated a large blue tube.
It poofs up and appears precisely like a type of slinky tubes little children crawl by. Gall says it really works greatest if you happen to can run it in rooms that are not too large, like in a single day in a bed room, for instance. And for now, we have it operating nonstop.
For NPR Information, I am Alejandra Borunda.
(SOUNDBITE OF J. COLE SONG, “FORBIDDEN FRUIT”)
Copyright © 2025 NPR. All rights reserved. Go to our web site phrases of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for additional info.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This textual content is probably not in its closing type and could also be up to date or revised sooner or later. Accuracy and availability could differ. The authoritative report of NPR’s programming is the audio report.