Estimation of the diesel exhaust exposures of railroad workers: I. Current exposures

✍ Scribed by Susan R. Woskie; Thomas J. Smith; S. Katharine Hammond; Marc B. Schenker; Eric Garshick; Frank E. Speizer

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1988
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 869 KB
• Volume: 13
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0271-3586
• DOI: 10.1002/ajim.4700130307

✦ Synopsis

As a part of a series of epidemiological studies of railroad workers, measurements were made to characterize workers' exposures to diesel exhaust. Since diesel exhaust is not a single compound, an exposure marker was sought. The personal exposures to respirable particulate matter (RPM) of over 530 workers in 39 common jobs were measured in four U.S. railroads over a three-year period. Significant amounts of cigarette smoke (20-90%) were found in many of these samples. Therefore, the respirable particulate concentration, adjusted to remove the fraction of cigarette smoke (ARP), was chosen as a marker of diesel exhaust exposures. The geometric mean exposures to ARP ranged from 17 micrograms/m3 for clerks to 134 micrograms/m3 for locomotive shop workers. Significant interrailroad variations were observed in some job groups indicating that the different facilities, equipment, and work practices found among the railroads can affect a worker's exposure to diesel exhaust. Climate was also found to have a significant effect on exposure in some job groups.