Clothing dryers can cause fabric lint to become airborne dust
I was amazed to learn that North and South America are plagued with dust clouds coming across the Atlantic from the Saharan Desert.
It amazes me that so much dust can get so high into the atmosphere that it can travel tens of thousands of miles before settling back toward the Earth.
I assumed that the rising dust percentages in my state were due to residential and commercial development, but that is only half the story. Yes, a lot of industrial and agricultural work will create a dusty environment, but my particular state hugs the Atlantic ocean. Apparently, a lot of our dust that we get here is coming across the ocean from West Africa. After it finishes its journey through the upper atmosphere, it eventually falls back to the Earth as it comes into contact with dry land. Every place between my state and Brazil is getting inundated with dust outside right now. However, I learned about another source for dust in my house, and that’s my clothing dryer. I read that the same fabric lint that you pull out of your dryer’s lint trap before each load of laundry can get into your indoor air. Obviously your dryer isn’t air tight and can’t be expected to retain all of the lint that is generated by your clothing as it is heated up and dried out. Because I do so much laundry each week, I have been changing the filters in my air conditioner and air purifiers more frequently. The dust on those filters does not lie, and I will be looking for ways to limit my use of the clothes dryer. I might even put up a clothesline in the backyard to save on energy as well.