How big of a fan do we need to blow away city smog?

[pepsibluefan]

Hello! I am new here. I hope your days are going well.

 

I think this would be fun to ask. How big and powerful would a fan need to be to blow away smog from a major city like say..New York city or a major city in china since they have the biggest population problem? We are talking about a single big fan powered by eletricity. (Honestly I think the fan needs a power plant of its own.)

 

What kind of physics are involved in such a monstrosity? how big and heavy would the fan blades need to be?

Edited January 19, 2015 by pepsibluefan

[Phi for All]

Is this plan similar to the one where my neighbor blows his leaves onto my yard? He's firmly convinced he made those leaves disappear completely, since they aren't a problem for him anymore.

[pepsibluefan]

Is this plan similar to the one where my neighbor blows his leaves onto my yard? He's firmly convinced he made those leaves disappear completely, since they aren't a problem for him anymore.

 

 

Pretty much the same thing. Did that really happen to you? just wow if he did.

Edited January 19, 2015 by pepsibluefan

[EdEarl]

Smog from LA blows across the US to increase smog levels in many places in the US, for example in Big Ben National Park, where there would be no smog except for imports.

[Strange]

This would be a good question to submit to Randall Munroe's What If site: https://whatif.xkcd.com/

[iNow]

Would need to know total volume of air, what the prevailing conditions were and which way and how intensely the existing winds were blowing, what obstacles are in the way like mountains and buildings, how much it takes to move the particles forward, how dense is the smog, does humidity level have an impact, if fan size is more important than fan speed and how those two variables interact, etc.

[StringJunky]

Rather than blow the smog to ones neighbour, wouldn't it be better all around to use the fan in a configuration that directs the smog into a ginormous air-scrubbing unit?

[iNow]

... Or we could pump it into the air supply of every major oil company board room, every Wall Street conference room that drives earnings from oil and auto, and also into the US congress and continue to do so until they take more intensive and reasonable actions to clean and prevent it in the first place.

[Phi for All]

We haven't mentioned how this would affect local weather. If you create a wind strong enough to blow out the smog from a major city, you'd definitely be affecting evaporative processes.

[pepsibluefan]

I can try to answer this the best I can:

 

 

 

Would need to know total volume of air, what the prevailing conditions were and which way and how intensely the existing winds were blowing, what obstacles are in the way like mountains and buildings, how much it takes to move the particles forward, how dense is the smog, does humidity level have an impact, if fan size is more important than fan speed and how those two variables interact, etc.

 

I don't know the total volume of air for the whole city of New York. Lets say it was a sunny summers day and not windy since most smog clouds like those conditions the most. Well, you don't have mountains but you have the whole city of New York and their buildings. The actual physical location would be like 2 to 3 miles away from the city? Can't we have size and speed? I guess I would choose size since we need to blow away all that smog in New York city. I guess the smog is average I suppose. I wouldn't think humidity level would have an impact. Since a high pressure is above new york city the humidity should be around..40%? Not sure how those two variacles interact honestly lol