The odor from smoke accumulation indoors can be a pain. Removing smoke from the indoor air is a quite challenging task, and for that, you must look for the causes of the smoke first.
At this point, everyone from children to adults knows – even if they don’t take it seriously – that smoking cigarette is bad for your health that is why it is important to quit smoking. But, what makes smoking even worse is that it does not only affect the user but others surrounding him, as well. The smoke you exhale gets trapped in the surroundings.
Besides, other factors that add to the smoke concentration in your home, workplace, cars, etc. are cooking, wildfires, bonfires in the backyards etcetera. This is why air purifiers for smoke are essential in such places.
The Dangers
The most usual cause of the smoke odor is the second-hand smoke. Second-hand smoke is far more dangerous, for it affects everyone inhaling the air from the surroundings. In layman’s term, second-hand smoke is any smoke that gets into the inside air indirectly, whether from smoking, vaping, cooking, or fires. While people who smoke do not mean harm to anyone (but themselves), that is exactly smoking indoors does.
Smoke contains over four-thousand chemical compounds, and more than 250 bacteria. No wonder it is one of the leading contributors to major lung diseases such as lung cancer and emphysema. The evil components of smoke have the potential to clog and block airways and arteries, leading to several pulmonary and cardiovascular diseases.
Expel Smoke & Its Odor from the Air
Removing smoke smell is no child’s play and demands patience. The process of driving out smoke odor depends on the severity of the contamination. If the smoke has been always there and you have just started to find it irritating, you are going to have to do a lot of hard work, including restoration, moving and replacing furniture and scrubbing the walls and floors.
We have discussed the biggest cause of the smoke odor, smoking. Although the best solution anyone can think of to keep smoke out of indoor spaces is to restrict smoking indoors, it is not at all a complete solution. It seems like a possible enough solution, but goes only for cigarette smoke; what about the other factors that contribute to the smoke odor in the indoor spaces. Now, you cannot go cook outside on the roads or stop the wildfires, can you?
If you don’t want your home to smell like an ashtray or are seriously worried about the health-damaging effects smoke has, try these tips and precautions to minimize the smoke odor and smoke from the indoor atmosphere.
Open the Windows
The most convenient way to drive smoke smell from your indoor air is to open the windows now and then. This might not eliminate all the smoke and its smoke from inside your home, but it will certainly help alleviate it. This tip is helpful especially if you have a smoker in your home. If you live in regions that are too hot or too cold to keep your windows open most of the time, try doing this in intervals. For example, you can open windows after each cooking and smoking session. This will inhibit smoke accumulation inside your home and also prevent your house from smelling like an ashtray.
Clean and Restore
You cannot rely on opening windows only. No matter what you do, some of the smoke will always linger behind and permeate into the furniture, upholstery, and clothes. The next step is to focus on fabric, the second easiest prey of smoke after the bloodstream. Take out the old carpets and upholstery, and begin with the bigger stuff that cannot be cleaned in a washing machine. Sprinkle baking soda on them and let them be for a couple of weeks. Baking soda will remove the smell by absorbing it after then you can treat it the stuff with steam and vacuum it.
To rid covers, cushions, and curtains of smoke smell, wash them in a washing machine, replacing the detergent with half cup vinegar. You can follow up with detergent.
Target the Source and Set Alternative Ways
The fairly obvious way to keep the house free of odor is to avoid smoking indoors. Since it is not possible in most cases, the best approach would be isolating a room for smoking. Be sure to pick out a room that is well-equipped with a vented exhaust fan.
Air – Purifiers
Although there are several ways to remove odor from your home, no permanent solution will help you keep out the smoke and its smell without having to give up smoking inside the house. But, there is a way to minimize the smoke concentration, hence the odor from the air on a regular base.
There are a whole lot of precautionary measures you can adopt to stop the smoke from accumulating inside your home space and prevent the stinging odor. But none of them will do it as good as an air purifier. Getting an air purifier is the wisest decision because the smoke has its ways of sneaking inside your home whether you smoke or not.
Although it is inefficient to ridding your house of 100% of the smoke, it sure does drive out the odor completely. The plus point, you won’t have to worry about opening your windows in extreme weather now and then to replace the smoke odor with fresh air. The air purification systems do their job by sucking all the indoor air into them. It cleans all the pulled-in air of dust and smoke particles replace the polluted air with fresh air.
The Most Effective Way to Clean the Atmosphere
The air purifier is by far the most effective way to clean your surrounding air of harmful particles and suffocating odor. However, not all air purifiers will help rid the air of the stale smell. HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) is the way to go if you want to kick out the lingering smell of smoke. HEPA purifiers trap the activated carbon and other microscopic particles from the air which leads to odor formation.
Conclusion
Keep in mind that smoke contains particles and gases. The odor results from gases. Ordinary air-purifiers and filters are not capable enough to trap the gases. Such filters might hinder momentarily the smoke odor with fresh air released from the purifier, but the odor will sprout up again. A type of air-purifiers – and more effective than the previous one – the Carbon Filter air purifier consists of activated charcoal. The activated charcoal acts as a sponge to absorb gases. These are designed to capture the smallest of particles and gases that usually escape from the claws of ordinary filters. The filters are extremely porous and pull in the maximum amount of particles, gases, and micro-organisms causing odor and throat or lung irritation. However, carbon does not work for these types of gases and particles.
