“It is like a single dead pixel on your phone, hardly noticeable”

Air purifiers sitting on tops of buses. Apparently this is another solution for Bangkok’s air pollution problems. Sounds like the people selling the mobile bus-top air purifiers have a very convincing sales person!

But Bangkok’s Mass Transit Authority director Surachai Eamvachirasakul says the department will go ahead with plans to install the air purifiers on top of Bangkok’s public buses. The promise is that it will reduce dust pollution. The air-filtration systems which will be installed on top of some of the state-operated buses are said to be capable of sucking in polluted air and blowing out clear air behind it. The director cited several test runs of the system as “evidence”.

“The device is capable of filtering 10,000 cubic metres of air per one trip. Scientific research indicated that an adult would breathe in an average 0.5 cubic metres per hour, so a bus would be able to provide clear air to more than 20,000 people on the road.”

This fuzzy maths shows an appalling ignorance of the larger pollution problem, most of which comes from plantation fires to the north of the capital – little to do with any local city contributions.

Even Chulalongkorn University biologist Jessada Denduangboripant says the plan “will have a near-zero impact on the PM2.5 dust particles”. Near zero. That’s a much closer estimate of the effectiveness of strapping air purifiers to the tops of the buses. Better still, don’t run the polluting old diesel buses in the first place which may cause more pollution per kilometre than the air purifiers could ever ‘filter’.

“If it is working as claimed, I believe it will only be capable of cleansing just a pixel of Bangkok,” Jessada said to Khaosod English.

Another scientist opined that the effectiveness of the air purifiers “would be trivial at best”, given the amount of air in the capital city against what the machines could process.

Matipon Tangmatitham, a researcher at the National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand got out his calculator.

“Based on the area of Bangkok and the height of dust particles from the ground, it gives out 1.568E+12 cubic metres of air that needed to be filtered. But the scheme would only produce 20,000 cubic meters of clean air, even when all the 500 buses are on the road.”

(And how much pollution is caused by the 500 buses cruising around the city?)

But BMTA director Surachai hit back at the scientists with a test result he gathered, which compares PM2.5 level before entering the device at 48-52 AQI with 1-5 AQI after passing through the device.

In truth, the effectiveness of the system would be almost impossible to calculate on a city-wide situation. A few extra kilometres of wind strength from the north on a day of burn-offs in the north would blow the pollution readings off the scale, completely obliterating any tiny improvements made in the immediate vicinity of the passing bus.

SOURCE: Khaosod English

China’s Great Wall Motors has agreed to buy the General Motors’ Thailand manufacturing plant in Rayong. It’s expected than the transaction will be completed by the end of this year. GM announced this week that it is accelerating a retreat from “unprofitable markets”, becoming more dependent on the US, China, Latin America and South Korea for its manufacturing. Read more about the pull-out HERE.

“GM is focusing on markets where we have the right strategies to drive robust returns, and prioritising global investments that will drive growth in the future of mobility, especially in electric and autonomous vehicles.”

GM said it will also pull the Chevrolet brand from Thailand, a major pickup and SUV market. With the proposed sale of the Thailand plant to Great Wall, GM passes up opportunities to expand operations in Southeast Asia.

Great Wall, one of China’s biggest SUV makers, says it will sell vehicles from the Thai manufacturing plant in Thailand, other ASEAN countries and Australia as the automaker seeks to expand globally amid a slowing domestic market. Earlier this year, it signed an agreement to buy a GM plant in India. The companies said they expected the transaction would be completed by the second half of this year.

Shi Ji, analyst at Haitong Internation, told Reuters that these two plant acquisitions will certainly accelerate the opening up of the auto market into parts of SE Asia.

“Such an acquisition could give Great Wall quick access to the ASEAN market, and Thailand is a good choice for its production base amid the country’s established supply chain in the automotive industry.”

Thailand produces around 2 million light vehicles each year, with just over half exported, most of them Japanese-based brands like Toyota, Honda and Suzuki. Great Wall may consider also building pickup trucks and SUVs in Thailand.

The automaker, which is building a car plant in China with BMW Group, sold 1.06 million light vehicles last year, including 65,175 units for export.

“There is no choice, if we don’t go global, we will not survive,” Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors said last year when they opened their first full assembly plant in Russia. Great Wall rival Geely is also looking to expand light-vehicle sales across the ASEAN region with Malaysia-based brand Proton.

SOURCE: Auto News

A few of the Great Wall SUVs and pickups currently made in China – Great Wall website

Police in Chon Buri province are investigating after dozens of needles and blood capsules were found yesterday in a canal in the Samae San area near Sattahip. The Chonburi Public Health Department and Provincial Health Administration confirms that none of the needles or capsules came from local hospitals, clinics or government organizations.

After investigating the needles and samples, officials say they’re from beauty clinics. It’s believed that most come from illegally licensed clinics.

Government organizations and Sattahip police are searching for the individual or individuals who dumped the items to determine exactly where they came from.

PHOTO: The Pattaya News

Provincial officials say the debris was removed from the canal after several hours of cleanup.

SOURCE: The Pattaya News