We think that our vulnerability to pollutants increases as soon as we step out the door. In the bigger cities of North America, we are warned to stay indoors when heavy smog warnings are in effect, and when the heat and humidity make the air quality so poor that it can become difficult for the young and old to breathe. As a result many of us stay inside. Leaving aside our concern about pollution, North Americans spend approximately 90% of their time indoors anyway – if not at home, then in the office, in a car or at school.

But, surprise, surprise. The great indoors is not as safe as we’ve been lulled into thinking. A relatively new area of scientific research is approaching our interior lifestyles with an increasing amount of wariness. The study of indoor pollutants indicates that we are very much exposed to toxic agents in places where we would least expect them. In classic sit-com style, Up Close and Toxic tells a cautionary tale warning against these environmental dangers that are literally right under our noses!

Toxicologists have found that the levels of most indoor air pollutants exceed those found outdoors – even in our most polluted cities. We know very little about the long term or cumulative effects of our indoor exposure. Cleaning products, pesticides, paint dust, lead particles in the carpet – can we ever feel safe again? Yes, of course. Up Close and Toxic will give audiences an entertaining wake-up call, and make the sources of indoor pollution easy to understand.

Photo credit: Jared Purdy

Our guide through this invisible world is a typical, yet fictional North American family – a group of actors, brought together in studio to provide a familiar backdrop to this intimate portrait of indoor pollutants. As they make their way through the day, mom, dad, daughter, toddler and dog interact with countless everyday items that are potentially harmful to them. But they don’t know half of the risks. Fortunately we have three experts on hand who delve into the very things that we have come to depend on, the very things that might make families like this one sick. These experts appear in the documentary as "friendly ghosts," brainy apparitions who know what dangers lurk in the new shag carpet. But just as they are oblivious to the off-gassing from the furniture polish, the family is oblivious to the presence of these experts. Our invisible friends make themselves known to the audience whenever there is a pollutant to be disclosed… needless to say, they’re around for most of the film. Our experts are Dr. Richard Corsi, Dr. Donna Mergler, and John Roberts.

Dr. Richard Corsi is an associate professor of environmental engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. His research focuses on the sources of volatile and hazardous air pollutants, and his interest in indoor air quality continues to grow. Dr. Corsi takes into account many air pollution sources that would generally be considered "non-traditional" and so have not received significant attention in the past. He and his team of researchers analyze sources such as drinking water (showers, washing machines, dishwashers, kitchen sinks), roofing materials, microcomputers, photocopiers, sewers, septic tanks, engineered wood products (particleboard, plywood), soil vapour intrusion into homes, and the interior components of cars (leading to that "new car smell" we all like).

Dr. Donna Mergler is a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Quebec at Montreal. From 1995 to 2000, she headed UQAM’s Centre for the Study of Biological Interactions in Human Health (CINBIOSE). Her research interests focus on the identification of early physiological and neurological changes related to exposure to neurotoxic substances (metal and organic solvents and certain gases), thermoregulation and, more broadly, on the effects of working conditions on women’s health. Since 1996, Dr. Mergler’s work and that of her Canadian-Brazilian team of researchers in the Amazon region has been influential, having revolutionized our understanding of how mercury contamination process affects the food chain.

John Roberts is a committed advocate of improving indoor air quality. Roberts got into this area after working for the Puget Sound Air Pollution Control Agency. It was 1974 and he was asked to do a study of road dust. In the study he measured paired samples of road dust and house dust, and much to his amazement, found levels were higher in the home. Ever since then he has devoted his life's work to dust. "After that study it became a mission and we revealed all of these time bombs that people would rather forget." Dr. Roberts pioneered surface "dust samplers" – super vacuums really – which contribute to his company’s speciality in assessing and controlling dangerous pollutants in the home. Roberts believes that simple, low cost strategies can dramatically reduce exposure.

Through interaction with the family and our team of "ghost" experts, we learn things like children are more easily exposed to pollutants by breathing, eating and touching. Sam, the 13-month old toddler, is happily playing on the rug in the living room. First he puts his sticky fingers on the recently polished coffee table, then on the rug, then on the family dog… and finally back in his mouth again. He could put 76 things – including his toys or someone else’s fingers in his mouth over an hour! Until recently, no-one thought anything of this. However, recent studies on indoor pollution suggest that we are being exposed to 10 to 50 times more toxic chemicals indoors than outside. And for children exposure could be even higher still – they breathe faster and they eat and drink more per kilogram of body weight than adults do. In Up Close and Toxic, time-lapse demonstrates just how much and how widely pesticides from a neighbour’s lawn are deposited throughout the house by our family’s four-footed friend – Bud the dog.

Most of us think pollution occurs in extraordinary situations, on a scale that is beyond our immediate control. But everyday chemical pollution is within our control. Remember the somewhat stern tone your mother used to take as you made your way into the house, "off with your shoes before you take another step!" Well, she was likely concerned with the clean-up she’d have to do after dirt had been tracked over the tiles and broadloom. But what she probably didn’t realize is that wearing shoes inside the house is one the most common culprits in the spread of pollutants in our indoor environments. We think that occasional incidences such as sprinkling flea powder on the dog are harmless. But we don’t consider, or quite possibly aren’t even aware of, the cumulative effect of the quick fix solutions at our disposal. One of the many truths to emerge in Up Close and Toxic is that we have become tolerant of the by-products of the chemical revolution by bringing them into our homes, complacent as we allow the ease and affordability of household products to cloud our common sense. Can we really afford to ignore indoor pollution, which the American Environmental Protection Agency has recently listed as one of the top five sources of concern for people’s health?

Up Close and Toxic discloses the many surprising – and not so surprising – ways that we are exposed to pollution – hazardous gases, particulate matter and various chemical nasties in the very places we feel safest. But lest we all think of packing up and heading to the hills, The Nature of Things will be producing a website that presents a number of simple and inexpensive solutions to the problem of everyday exposure to low levels of toxic chemicals.