261028 – Clean Indoor Air, Ozone and Negative Ion Generators

October 28, 2026 Leave a comment

Clean Indoor Air:

What Works, and Why Ozone Isn’t the Answer

· @Thomas Lee Abshier, ND

Indoor air is the most neglected exposure in most people’s health programs, and the remedy is source control, ventilation, and verified filtration. It is not ozone.

A recent episode of the Redacted program interviewed Mike Dillon, CEO of Air Water Healing, about the air we breathe at home. Much of what he said deserves attention. A person can choose his food and filter his water, but he cannot stop breathing, and he breathes mostly indoors. Several specific claims in the interview, however, are wrong, and the central product claim- that a device that releases ozone and ions into the living space is the best way to clean it- runs against nearly a century of evidence.

I stand with taking indoor air seriously. This article separates what the interview gets right from what it gets wrong, explains why ozone doesn’t belong in occupied rooms, and ends with a practical sequence a household can follow. (Medical ozone therapy, which is never inhaled, is a different subject and is not addressed here.)

What the interview gets right

The core concern is sound. Several supporting facts are accurate or close.

  • We live indoors. The figure of about 90% of time spent indoors is the standard estimate used by EPA and indoor-air researchers.
  • We breathe a great deal of air. Roughly 10,000 to 11,000 liters a day is a reasonable estimate for an adult. (The interview’s other breathing figures are off: a resting breath is about half a liter, not an eighth, and a normal resting rate is 12 to 20 breaths a minute. Slow breathing practice has merit, but five breaths a minute is not a physiological requirement.)
  • Homes off-gas. Carpets, adhesives, composite wood, upholstery, mattresses with flame retardants, cleaning products, and cooking all release volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and particles. Formaldehyde from composite wood is a real and documented problem.
  • Mold matters. Damp buildings are consistently associated with respiratory symptoms and asthma. A person who reacts in one room and not another may be reacting to a real local source.
  • Fine particles harm the heart, not only the lungs. In 2010, the American Heart Association concluded that evidence is consistent with a causal link between fine particle (PM2.5) exposure and cardiovascular illness and death, and called PM2.5 a modifiable risk factor (Brook et al., Circulation).
  • Regional differences are real. Bakersfield, in Kern County, ranked as the worst U.S. metro area for year-round particle pollution in the American Lung Association’s 2026 State of the Air report (ALA). PM2.5 is measured in micrograms per cubic meter, not “parts per million” as stated in the interview.
  • Tight houses trap what is made inside them. This is the strongest point in the interview. Energy-efficient, storm-resistant construction (Florida tightened its building practices after Hurricane Andrew, which struck in 1992, not 1995 or 1996) reduces the uncontrolled air leakage that once diluted indoor pollutants. The cigar analogy is apt: the source has not changed, but the concentration has. A tight house without planned ventilation is a sealed container.

The “thunderstorm in a box”: ozone and ions indoors

The device described in the interview works, in the guest’s words, by trapping a thunderstorm in a box: it releases “activated oxygen in the form of low-level ozone and negative ions” into the room. That is how an ozone generator paired with an ionizer works, and the evidence against using one in an occupied home is long and consistent.

Ozone injures the lungs. Ozone is the main component of smog. EPA lists decreased lung function, asthma aggravation, chest pain, cough, airway inflammation, and greater susceptibility to respiratory infection as effects of inhaling it, and notes that exercise increases the dose (EPA). Terms such as “activated oxygen” or “energized oxygen” suggest a healthy form of oxygen. Ozone is a toxic gas with very different properties.

At safe levels, ozone does not clean the air. EPA’s review of the peer-reviewed literature found that at concentrations within public health standards, ozone has little ability to remove indoor contaminants. Specifically, according to the same EPA document:

  • Many common indoor chemicals react with ozone so slowly that for practical purposes they do not react at all; ozone does not remove carbon monoxide or formaldehyde.
  • Where ozone does react, it can make new irritants. In one experiment with chemicals from new carpet, ozone produced aldehydes, and the total organic chemical load in the air rose rather than fell.
  • Ozone does not remove dust or pollen.
  • To decontaminate air of bacteria and mold, ozone would need to reach 5 to 10 times the public health limit, and even then it may not reach organisms embedded in porous material.
  • Following the manufacturer’s directions does not guarantee safety. Room size, door position, furnishings, outdoor ozone, and ventilation all change the concentration, and the sense of smell for ozone fades quickly with exposure.

This is not a new finding. EPA notes that health professionals have been refuting ozone air-cleaning claims since a 1913 paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

California restricts these devices. In 2007, the California Air Resources Board adopted the nation’s first rule limiting ozone from indoor air cleaners to 0.050 parts per million, the same limit the FDA sets for medical devices. Since 2010, every indoor air cleaner sold in or shipped to California must be certified to that limit (CARB). Before the rule, CARB estimated that well over 500,000 Californians were routinely exposed above the state ozone standard because of ozone generators in their homes (South Coast AQMD summary).

Ionizers move dust; they do not remove it. The guest acknowledged that his device drops particles to the floor, and that users will see “years’ worth” of dust settle in the first days. Ionizers charge particles that cling to floors, walls, and furniture, where foot traffic and vacuuming can stir them back into the air. EPA reports that ionizers were less effective at removing dust, smoke, pollen, and mold spores than high-efficiency filters. The trapped-smoke demonstration on camera showed particles leaving the air inside a small box. It did not show them leaving the house.

The rancher’s testimonial that his wife no longer smelled manure on his clothes fits what the EPA describes: ozone can mask an odor without removing its source.

Photocatalytic oxidation and the “cat, not the mousetrap”

The device also uses photocatalytic oxidation (PCO): ultraviolet light striking a catalyst surface, usually titanium dioxide, which oxidizes organic molecules that touch it. PCO is real chemistry and an active area of research. Two claims made in the interview don’t hold up.

PCO does not hunt through the house. The reaction happens on the lit catalyst surface. Air has to pass over that surface to be treated. Devices that claim to send a cleaning “plasma” into every room, in practice, send out ozone, ions, or other reactive products of the cell, which brings us back to the previous section.

Incomplete oxidation creates formaldehyde. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory tested a UV-PCO air cleaner with realistic indoor mixtures of VOCs and found net production of formaldehyde and acetaldehyde. The researchers concluded that formaldehyde levels are likely to rise when such a device runs in a building with ordinary VOC sources, and that a downstream chemical scrubber was needed to counteract it (Hodgson et al., LBNL). A separate study of an in-duct system found formaldehyde and acetaldehyde as by-products for every compound tested (Building and Environment, 2014). Formaldehyde is one of the very chemicals the interview warns about in furniture.

Particle size is not the measure. The interview suggests asking an AI how small a particle PCO can eliminate. The relevant questions are different: how much air the device actually treats per hour, what fraction of each pollutant it removes in a single pass, and what it emits. Those numbers come from independent testing, not from a chatbot or a trade-show booth.

HEPA filters: what they actually capture

The interview claims that HEPA filters and HVAC systems cannot stop ultrafine, sub-micron particles. This has the physics backward.

A HEPA filter is rated at 0.3 microns because that is close to the size it captures least well, the “most penetrating particle size.” It must remove at least 99.97% of particles at that size. Larger particles are caught by impaction and interception. Smaller particles, below about 0.1 micron, move erratically from collisions with air molecules and strike the fibers by diffusion, so efficiency rises again for ultrafines (overview of HEPA standards and mechanisms). HEPA is not a sieve with 0.3-micron holes.

The straw demonstration, in which a paper ball six inches away is not sucked into a straw, describes a single stroke of suction. A room air cleaner works differently. It recirculates the room’s air several times an hour, and each pass removes most particles. The useful number is the Clean Air Delivery Rate (CADR), certified by the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, which EPA points consumers to.

Two honest limits of HEPA filters: they do not remove gases or odors (that takes activated carbon or another sorbent), and a central furnace filter, which is usually not HEPA, only cleans air while the blower runs. A HEPA filter also needs replacing. The interview presents “no filter to buy” as a saving. A filter that fills with dust worked; an ionizer that never fills has sent the dust to the carpet.

Spraying, graphene oxide, 6G, and the flashlight test

The host opened by stating as fact that aluminum and other particulates are deliberately sprayed into the sky, that graphene oxide from vaccines is also dispersed in the air, and that 6G can manipulate particles inside the body. These claims are not established, and the air-quality argument does not need them.

  • Aerial spraying. In 2016, researchers from UC Irvine and the Carnegie Institution surveyed 77 atmospheric chemists and geochemists who study contrails and atmospheric deposition. Seventy-six said they had never seen evidence of a secret large-scale spraying program, and they attributed the cited evidence to normal contrail physics and poor sampling methods, such as collecting water in jars with metal lids (UC Irvine). Solar geoengineering is a real research subject and has open proponents; that is a reason for public scrutiny, not evidence of a covert program now operating.
  • Graphene oxide. It is not listed among the ingredients of the COVID-19 vaccines authorized in the United States, and the interview offered no measurement of it in the air.
  • 6G. It is not deployed. No physical mechanism was offered to explain how a radio signal would steer particles inside a person’s tissues.
  • The flashlight test. A strong beam at night lights up whatever scatters light: dust, pollen, fine water droplets, smoke, and insects. The eye cannot tell aluminum from pollen. The test shows that air contains particles, which is true everywhere, and nothing about their composition.

The guest’s other outdoor concerns are better founded. Diesel exhaust, wildfire smoke, traffic, and industrial emissions are measured, regulated, and linked to disease. Pesticide drift near treated land is a legitimate local question, though “within four miles of a golf course” is not a figure I can trace to a study.

Carbon-bound nutrition and the Pauling story

The interview closed by bundling the air device with a liquid mineral supplement described as “carbon-bound.” Several claims were made for it.

  • “Organic” means containing carbon. True in chemistry, and the body is roughly 18% carbon by mass. But most minerals in food and in supplements already travel bound to carbon-containing molecules: citrate, glycinate, gluconate, picolinate. “Carbon-bound” is not a distinct category of nutrient, and the word “organic” does not make one form superior.
  • Absorption “in less than 18 seconds.” No study was named. Minerals are absorbed mainly in the small intestine, which a swallowed liquid does not reach in seconds.
  • Leftover carbon that hunts glyphosate, metals, and parasites. Unabsorbed carbon compounds don’t target specific toxins. Activated charcoal binds substances in the gut nonspecifically, and it can also bind nutrients and medications.
  • Linus Pauling. Pauling won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1954 and the Peace Prize in 1962, eight years later, not two. The line that every disease traces to a mineral deficiency is widely attributed to him, but I have found no traceable source for it, nor for a 1976 address to Congress on the subject.

Mineral status matters, and electrolytes do help some people with migraine and exertion. A naturopathic physician tests and replaces what is deficient. That is a different practice from selling one bottle to everyone as a detox for air pollution.

Why the concern remains plausible

Correcting a sales pitch does not dissolve the concern beneath it. There are good reasons to believe indoor air is doing more harm than most people, and most physicians, recognize.

We did not evolve in sealed boxes. For nearly all of human history, people breathed outdoor air or the air of drafty, open dwellings. The sealed, synthetic interior is perhaps two generations old. The intuition that spending 90% of life in it is wrong is reasonable.

Chemicals enter homes faster than we study them. Furniture, mattresses, flooring, and cleaners contain compounds whose indoor emissions are rarely disclosed to the buyer. The guest’s complaint here is fair: a person cannot easily learn which flame retardant is in his sofa or how long it off-gasses. Some of these chemicals, such as earlier brominated flame retardants, were withdrawn only after they had accumulated in people’s bodies.

Regulation stops at the front door. Outdoor air is governed by national standards and monitoring networks. Indoor air, where exposure is greatest, has no comparable standard in most homes. Building codes for tight construction were driven by energy costs and storm insurance, while ventilation requirements have lagged.

Money flows in more than one direction. Manufacturers profit from cheap, off-gassing materials; vendors profit from fear of what they release. The household stands between them with little independent information. That gap is why claims like those in this interview find a ready audience.

Medicine rarely asks. Few clinical histories include questions about mold, new furniture, gas stoves, or ventilation. Patients who sense their home is making them ill often get no hearing, and they go looking elsewhere. The answer isn’t to dismiss them, but to give them methods that work.

What to do: a practical sequence

EPA ranks approaches by effectiveness: control the source, ventilate, then clean the air. The sequence below follows that order and lists the least expensive options first.

  1. Remove or reduce sources.
    • Replace products labeled with poison-control warnings with simple cleaners (vinegar, baking soda, unscented soap). The guest’s advice here is good.
    • Air out new furniture, mattresses, and flooring in a garage or ventilated room before bringing them into bedrooms. Prefer solid wood and low-VOC or certified low-emission products.
    • Fix leaks and damp spots promptly. Keep indoor humidity roughly between 30% and 50%. Have visible mold or a persistent musty smell assessed and remediated at the source.
    • Do not smoke or burn candles, incense, or other indoor smoke sources.
  2. Test for what you cannot see.
    • Test for radon. It is odorless, common in many regions including the northern Rockies, and a leading cause of lung cancer in people who never smoked (EPA).
    • Consider an inexpensive monitor for PM2.5 and carbon dioxide. Rising CO2 is a simple sign that a room is under-ventilated.
  3. Ventilate deliberately.
    • Use range hoods that vent outdoors, especially over gas stoves, and bathroom exhaust fans.
    • Open windows when outdoor air is clean; during wildfire season, check the local Air Quality Index at AirNow.
    • In a tight house, ask about a heat- or energy-recovery ventilator, which brings in fresh air without losing most of the heat.
  4. Filter what remains.
    • Upgrade the furnace filter to MERV 13 if the system can handle it, and run the fan more often.
    • Add a portable HEPA cleaner in the bedroom. Choose one with a certified CADR of at least two-thirds of the room’s square footage. Add activated carbon if odors or VOCs are the concern.
  5. Avoid devices that add pollutants.
    • Do not run ozone generators in occupied rooms. Be wary of products marketed with “activated oxygen,” “energized oxygen,” “plasma,” or ionization as their main mechanism. A device certified to California’s ozone limit is a reasonable minimum (CARB air-cleaner regulation).

A household that does the first four steps will have cleaner air than any single machine can provide, and it will know, by measurement rather than by smell, that it does.

References

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