Latest Pollution Articles and News

Global emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) – the main cause of global warming – increased by 45 % between 1990 and 2010, and reached an all-time high of 33 billion tonnes in 2010. Increased energy efficiency, nuclear energy and the growing contribution of renewable energy are not compensating for the globally increasing demand for power and transport, which is strongest in developing countries. This increase took place despite emission reductions in industrialised countries during the...

The incidence of type 2 diabetes and hypertension increases with cumulative levels of exposure to nitrogen oxides, according to a new study led by researchers from the Slone Epidemiology Center (SEC) at Boston University. The study, which appears online in the journal Circulation, was led by Patricia Coogan, D.Sc., associate professor of epidemiology at the Boston University School of Public Health and the SEC. While it is well established that air pollution increases the risks of...

A report by researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health provides an expanded review of six new air quality regulations proposed or recently adopted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA). These include the first national standards for reducing dangerous emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from power plants. Though the cost of implementing the new regulations is estimated to be about $195 billion over the next 20 years or so, the economic...

For many people in the developing world getting enough food to eat 
 is a persistent challenge. However the challenge does not stop there. A
 new issue of the international journal Energy Policy details 
 the human and environmental cost of cooking food using the only energy 
 source available to many people, woody biomass. 
 
 The Special Issue explores the type of decision frameworks 
 that are needed to guide policy development for clean cooking fuels and
 to ensure that the provision of clean energy becomes a central 
 component of sustainable development. ...

Earth's deep oceans may absorb enough heat at times to flatten the rate of global warming for periods of as long as a decade--even in the midst of longer-term warming. This according to a new analysis led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). The study, based on computer simulations of global climate, points to ocean layers deeper than 1,000 feet as the main location of the "missing heat" during periods such as the past decade when global air temperatures showed little trend. The findings also suggest that several more intervals like this can be ...

A study by Columbia Business School Professor Eric Johnson, co-director of the Center for Decision Sciences (http://www4.gsb.columbia.edu/decisionsciences) at Columbia Business School, Ye Li, a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Decision Sciences, and Lisa Zaval, a Columbia graduate student in psychology, found that those who thought the current day was warmer than usual were more likely to believe in and feel concern about global warming than those who thought the day was unusually cold. The study, recently featured in Psychological Science, explains why public belief in global ...

While it may be years before the health effects of the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico are known, a new study shows that fetal exposure to a chemical found in crude oil is associated with an increased risk of congenital heart disease (CHD). The study, to be presented Saturday, April 30, at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Denver, also showed that babies who had been exposed in utero to a chemical found in cleaning agents and spot removers were at increased risk of CHD. Environmental causes of CHD have been suspected, and animal studies have suggested certain

Palo Alto, CA—Scientists have known for decades that black carbon aerosols add to global warming. These airborne particles made of sooty carbon are believed to be among the largest man-made contributors to global warming because they absorb solar radiation and heat the atmosphere. New research from Carnegie's Long Cao and Ken Caldeira, along with colleagues George Ban-Weiss and Govindasamy Bala, quantifies how black carbon's impact on climate depends on its altitude in the atmosphere. Their work, published online by the journal Climate Dynamics, could have important implications for combating

A mass extinction is hard enough for Earth's biosphere to handle, but when you chase it with prolonged oxygen deprivation, the biota ends up with a hangover that can last millions of years. Such was the situation with the greatest mass extinction in Earth's history 250 million years ago, when 90 percent of all marine animal species were wiped out, along with a huge proportion of plant, animal and insect species on land. A massive amount of volcanism in Siberia is widely credited with driving the disaster, but even after the immense outpourings of lava and toxic gases tapered off, oxygen

Indonesia has promised to become a world leader in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In 2009, the president committed to a 26% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 to below 'business-as-usual' levels. Of this total, 14% would have to come from reducing emissions from deforestation or forest degradation. Investments by foreign governments and other bodies are expected to raise total emission reduction from 26% to 41%. While international negotiations on rules about how to reduce emissions and slow global warming are slow but ongoing, the Indonesian and Norwegian governments

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Members of the engineering faculty at Oregon State University have invented a new type of radiation detection and measurement device that will be particularly useful for cleanup of sites with radioactive contamination, making the process faster, more accurate and less expensive. A patent has been granted on this new type of radiation spectrometer, and the first production of devices will begin soon. The advance has also led to creation of a Corvallis-based spinoff company, Avicenna Instruments, based on the OSU research. The market for these instruments may ultimately

A study appearing this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds that microscopic particles of dust, emitted into the atmosphere when dirt breaks apart, follow similar fragment patterns to broken glass and other brittle objects. The research, by National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) scientist Jasper Kok, suggests there are several times more dust particles in the atmosphere than previously thought, since shattered dirt appears to produce an unexpectedly high number of large dust fragments. The finding has implications for understanding future climate change

Billfish and tuna, important commercial and recreational fish species, may be more vulnerable to fishing pressure because of shrinking habitat, according to a new study published by scientists from NOAA, The Billfish Foundation, and University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. An expanding zone of low oxygen, known as a hypoxic zone, in the Atlantic Ocean is encroaching upon these species' preferred oxygen-abundant habitat, forcing them into shallower waters where they are more likely to be caught. During the study, published recently in the journal Fisheries

In the world-wide race to develop energy sources that are seen as "green" because they are renewable and less greenhouse gas-intensive, sometimes the most basic questions remain unanswered. In a paper released today by the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary, authors Michal Moore, Senior Fellow, and Sarah M. Jordaan at Harvard University in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, look at the basic question of whether these energy sources are ethical. In addition to arguing that the greenhouse gas benefits of biofuel are overstated by many policymakers, the authors

According to "Israel’s National Report on Climate Change", prepared by Pe’er and other members of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev on behalf of the Israeli Ministry of the Environmental Protection, the frequency, intensity and extent of the fires would increase due to the prolongation of droughts, increase in water evaporation and an increased frequency of intense heat waves. At a warming of 1.5 degrees by the year 2100, which is by now considered a conservative scenario, models predict the desert to expand northward by 300 to 500 kilometers to the north. Mediterranean ecosystems, such