Global Air Pollution, From Above 545
neutron_p writes "Based on satellite observations, the high-resolution global atmospheric map of nitrogen dioxide pollution makes clear just how human activities impact air quality. I'm a bit surprised not to see that many red blobs above US and the strange one is on the east of Russia."
Take note (Score:5, Insightful)
That being said, China is still developing. Pollution should be a big concern for them, but it's an unfortunate fact of life for now. As their technology improves, the pollution levels should drop. With one caveat, that is:
Many modernized countries have sent their manufacturing to China. Thus placing restrictions on countries to reduce their emissions will do little good when we've already sent the real pollution over there. I'm not sure how we can respond to the situation, but it's important to pay attention to it.
The blob over Canada is actually a bit surprising, but I'm guessing that's related to the earlier article on the odd increases in pollution levels. I do have a thought on why North America sees less pollution than Europe, however. Since the North America has a massive amount of farmland and forest land, a good deal of the pollution is sapped up by these massive carbon sinks. This doesn't actually impact NO2 levels, but it does explain some of the pollution reduction.
FWIW, it seems that NO2 is primary produced by cars [airqualityontario.com]. Moving to the hydrogen vehicles of the future may help stop almost all NO2 production.
(P.S. I know slashdotters have a penchant for insulting people, but please try to keep your replies civil. I don't know everything, so correct me in a polite manner. Thank you.)
I'm not suprised, because I have a clue (Score:5, Insightful)
No serious student of current events can escape the reality that political freedom and economic prosperity are linked. The old soviet empire attempted to foster economic openness to gain it's productivity benefits while keeping political freedom in the hands of the Party. They failed. China is making the same attempt and the signs are they are also going to fail. Freedom is the natural state of affairs and you can't supress it in one sphere while keeping it in the others.
Rising standards of living solve most of the pressing problems facing the world today. Birth rates are lowest in the free/wealthy nations and highest in the poor/oppressed ones. Wealthy/Free nations don't tend to make war on each other. Wealthy nations don't tend to produce terrorists either.
Johannesburg glowing (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:1, Insightful)
except for the fact that even with hydrogen powered vehicles you're still burning air unless you're talking about fuel cell technology, which is still too young to be widely useful. So even if we switch to burning hydrogen, you've still gotta burn it with air, which is something like 70% nitrogen, so it won't make a difference.
Re:Take note (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And not only that... (Score:3, Insightful)
Are nuclear options not alternatives to fossil fuels?
I am not a biologist (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:all the pollution activist in the US are pointl (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:4, Insightful)
One of the lower posters also raised a good point. Being a successful economy means you can use your sources of energy to create more money. The USA has mastered this, largely because we were one of the first nations to do this, and because we were blessed w/ huge amounts of wood, then coal, and then oil that allowed us to get so far ahead. This is grossly oversimplified, but a lot of our infrastructure is already paid for, so our energy is cheap. Contrast that w/ China, who is just now trying to create that "good living through more energy" that we've enjoyed for decades, and you realize that their costs are higher. If they did it in a environmental way, it would cost even more, and they wouldn't make it as far w/ the same amount of money. It's easy to see why they have a black cloud, cuz that's what their money dictates. They'll spend more money in the future on it, but not until their (newly wealthier) middle class starts demanding it, and then they'll pass the cost along.
Where are the third world offenders? (Score:4, Insightful)
You can't tell someone that the world is dying when it is right in front of them, unchanged for years. They are trying to make a living, they get offered an opportunity to improve their environment, and don't change. Yet for some reason, even with *this* atmospheric data you can see who the "big offenders" supposedly are.
Why then, do global warmning advocates expend so much time and effort making third world countries try to adhere to restrictions even the US and China don't want to?
Re:Take note (Score:2, Insightful)
For all the whining and complaining about how the US should have joined the Kyoto accord, it's very easy to see that China is the #1 offender, and that Europe is not doing so hot itself. What good would Kyoto have done if it exempted the country who needs it most?
Umm... what? That makes no sense. The #1 offender being exempted doesn't magically erase the good of all the other countries signing the treaty. It's like saying "what's the good of arresting lesser terrorists if we haven't arrested Bin Laden?"
(P.S. I know slashdotters have a penchant for insulting people, but please try to keep your replies civil. I don't know everything, so correct me in a polite manner. Thank you.)
For future reference, characterising other people as whiners is not a good idea if you want replies to be civil.
good start (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:5, Insightful)
Now there aren't AFAIK any restrictions on China or other developing countries, but China has ratified the agreement and when they really step up as an industrialized country they will have restrictions imposed thus it is in their interest to stay within the future requirements.
Had there been placed restrictions on China or other developing countries they probably never would have signed the agreement because it might have inhibited their growth. (Now what is the real reason the U.S. isn't signing?)
Furthermore I don't think the true objective is reduced emissions, we're far to spoiled to let that happen. The point is getting a situation under control before it gets out of hand.
(P.S. I know slashdotters have a penchant for insulting people, but please try to keep your replies civil. I don't know everything, so correct me in a polite manner. Thank you.)
Ditto
That's where the Arctic haze comes from (Score:5, Insightful)
In Alaska, we often see a hazy [alaska.edu] sky [nsidc.org], caused by pollution from Siberia and points east.
For the long term, we should probably be more worried about the Soviet nuclear waste [atimes.com] the Soviets and now the Russians have accumulated in the Arctic and Pacific Oceans. Then there's the nuclear plants [rosatom.ru], two of them in Siberia, that we're down wind of. They were built by the same government which brought us Chernobyl [kiddofspeed.com].
If you're looking for things to worry about, you'll never run out.
Opening our eyes (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I'm not suprised, because I have a clue (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I'm not suprised, because I have a clue (Score:2, Insightful)
So, BushCo should just keep trucking the troops into every non-democratic country to enforce democracy at gunpoint? I mean, Iraq and Afghanistan are such "Cataclysmic Successes" [Bush, 2004] and we all know that our humanitarian efforts are applauded by the international community.
I'm sure most non-G8 countries are lining up to be the next
I'm sorry to sound trite, but your notion of a "simple solution" is so utterly niave and devoid of a clue that if you were in front of me at this moment, I'd be laughing hysterically while back handing you. Your statement is so stupid as to be both laughable and violently aggravating.
Someday you might decide to turn off Fox, pick up a book on US Foriegn policy in developing countries and realize that most countries hate us. Not for our freedom or SUV driving big Mac eating way of life, but for our policy of expolitation, assasination, political subversion and hypocritical support of biological warfare and terrorism where and when it serves out needs.
Actually, my simple plan would be for the US to get the fuck out of everyones face and go back to it's pre-WWI stance of isolationism and work on our domestic policy and our own problems instead of creating new ones for everyone else.
Hahaha -- Like that will ever happen.
I don't believe it (Score:2, Insightful)
If you read http://www.newscientist.com/hottopics/environment
Don't get me wrong, we do need to stop burning fossil fuels, stop driving SUVs and shoot trash into the sun. Climatologist is still synonymous with quack in my book.
Re:all the pollution activist in the US are pointl (Score:3, Insightful)
How many nations produce automobiles? US vehicles are used around the world.
How many nations produce aluminum? This is an extremely power-intensive procedure. (Anyone know what fraction of the US grid goes to these plants?)
I'm not sure about worldwide aluminum production, so I may be off there, but it's something to consider.
Re:I don't believe it (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:3, Insightful)
"The blob over Canada is actually a bit surprising"
Not sure which blob you are talking about. The really bad one in Eastern North America is almost certainly coming from the massive concentration of coal fired power plants in Ohio, Pensylvania and West Virginia some of which drifts in to Canada.
The lighter blob in Western Canada is almost certainly coal fired power plants in Alberta. they get half their electricity from coal and were trying to build more last I heard.
Not sure why the submitter is surprised there aren't more blobs over the U.S. There is one really nasty dense one over the Northeast where there is massive use of coal. All the lighter blobs over the west are also almost certainly coal fired power plants, there aren't a lot of cities or heavy industry in the Western U.S., its mostly farms, desert and empty space.
The cities on the Pacific Coast are in a long skinny line which probably serves to preclude a build up of a big blob for this satellite to see.
Coal plants in the West are a massive pollution source but they are spread out over a wide area so they end up not looking bad in this kind of measurement because the wind spreads it out so the concentration stays low.
I really doubt cars even come close to matching coal fired power plants for concentrated NO2 production. Maybe they match it in total but its much more diffuse than coal fired power plants which are giant blinking red blobs of concentrated NO2 to this satellite.
Its pretty obvious China is A) doing all of the worlds heavy manufacturing. Steel production in particular shows up well to this satellite. B) making heavy use of coal for power. China produces 75% of their power with Coal which is why they are the massive red blob they are.
Germany also gets 50% of its power from Coal which I wager accounts for some of the blob over Western Europe.
If the Bush administration figures out this satellite is doing what I think it is, which is mapping coal fired power plant pollution, there may be a sudden failure of this satellite after a mysterious missile launch from the U.S.
Re:Take note (Score:1, Insightful)
The region marked out around China has as much population as the whole of the U.S combined - so no excuses, and YES - George Bush has the worst environmental record of ALL your presicdents throughout history. Vote John Kerry - for the danity of the rest of the world. I beg you.
Re:And not only that... (Score:5, Insightful)
The idea of "electricity too cheap to meter" is a fantasy because you still need a bigarsed steam-powered generator no matter what the heat source, not because of fuel concerns. The quantity of fuel used is so vastly lower than the amount of coal and oil burned in fossil fuel plants that the cost of mining really isn't that much, even given the relative scarcity of the element itself.
It won't run out any time soon either if you reprocess spent fuel and also breed fissile materials from thorium, but both of those have materials-handling and security problems (not unsolvable, but enough that the US doesn't use them).
Electric heat, no; very inefficient. Ground source heat-pumps, yes.
Electric heating is as efficient as gas heating; in both cases, you're turning virtually all of the available energy into heat. A heat pump is more efficient than either because it draws heat from the surrounding area (at such a relatively small temperature difference, it costs less to do this than to just dump heat into the house). The reason we use gas heating instead of electric is that electrical energy is more expensive to produce, joule for joule, than the equivalent amount of natural gas. This is a production issue, as opposed to a point-of-use issue.
In short, while I agree with your positions, I disagree with the reasons
Re:I'm not suprised, because I have a clue (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually there is a lot of evidence that democracy can reduce economic growth in developing countries. You can look at India, which was mired in democratic socialism for years until they decided to end the "permit Raj", economically reform, and start significant economic growth.
China is growing very quickly, because the dictatorship demands that institutions (courts and such) have pro-growth policies. Private property is better protected in "communist" China today that in democratic Russia.
We can look at countries such as South Korea that developed well under dictatorships.
Even Iraq did pretty well, until Saddam got into war with Iran. Which shows that dictators can help development, as long as they don't turn on it.
On the other hand, developing nations do seem to reach an economic level where dictatorship is incompatible with further growth. South Korea hit that point and democratized, and China will reach that point soon as well.
Re:all the pollution activist in the US are pointl (Score:1, Insightful)
How many nations produce automobiles? US vehicles are used around the world.
They are also produced around the world. You surely don't think every Ford or Chrysler was built in Michigan?
Re:Opening our eyes (Score:3, Insightful)
Greenhouse denial is everywhere. The name is descriptive enough to know what it means, but I'll explain (as I have in umpteen other Slashdot posts). The Greenhouse is the accumulating atmospheric defect (from human perspective) that traps more solar energy than the biosphere has adapted to survive. It's a feedback loop, with excess CO2 gas - and others, like the NO2 demonstrated in this map - trapping more energy, which causes more biological cycles to release more CO2 into the atmosphere. The CO2 balance moves from one equilibrium to another, at differing concentrations. Some of these biological cycles include human activity, like burning oil and coal, or their byproducts. It's a cycle because the the increased concentration causes more extreme weather fluctuations, which stimulate burning more fuel (air conditioning, heating, transportation for refugees and commuting, etc), which generates more CO2.
People are very attached to their energy consumption, and the changes are relatively slow (over lifetimes and generations). So it's easy to deny the process, especially when the most powerful people depend on the industries that perpetuate the process. So people deny the Greenhouse. They are Greenhouse deniers. Like most pathological denial, they demand black and white proofs of subtle, complex phenomena, and make black and white statements to support their denial. So Greenhouse deniers will say that there's no evidence for human effects on the environment. This map is just another compelling confrontation with that denial, from which deniers cannot recover, at least in credibility from naive listeners.
There are lots of reasons to quit polluting. The Greenhouse is one of them. And the stubborn danger from Greenhouse deniers is a reason to cite examples like this when debunking their delusions.
Re:what are the facts though (Score:3, Insightful)
People keep pointing out that we didn't join Kyoto because the developing countries, ie China, didn't have strict limits. Thats true. Yes joining would put us at an economic disadvantage. However, when it comes to preventing a global catastrophe, I think its time to stop talking about who's playing fair, and take action. Whats more important, giving your grandchildren a chance to live in a world similar to the one you were given, or your stocks going up a couple points?
As to the thinning and forest management, this was a gift to the timber industries, and is much more than is required to prevent forest fires.
If you want to compare Bush's record to other presidents, have a look at the total amount of land reserved for preservation. His doesn't even compare to other presidents.
Re:Take note (Score:3, Insightful)
Last year, the only manufacturer of diesel passenger vehicles in the US was Volkswagen. This year, Mercedes (3xx CDI), and Jeep (Liberty CRD) also join the field. By 2006, who knows, maybe we'll even have diesel-electric hybrids...
Re:No (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:3, Insightful)
England isn't a major industrial nation - hasn't been for about 50 years. What remains of its heavy industry is concentrated in the north of the country, not the south, so this doesn't seem to align. I'd guess its actually the (mostly non-industrial) pollution from London.
Likewise I'm not sure what accounts for the large concentration of NO2 shown over the north of Italy. It looks like the Alps are generating a lot of pollution. That can't be right...
Eastern Russia? Try China (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Take note (Score:4, Insightful)
Wow, a lot of myths there, let me just cover the major ones.
Myth #1: public transportation is always inefficient.
Take a look at the public transportation systems of most of europe. There's no reason public transportation needs to be expensive, low-comfort, or have lousy geographic availability.
Myth #2: the american lifestyle must be changed to reduce energy use in america.
In fact, america could cut its energy use in half without a measurable impact on consumer lifestyles, through tried and tested energy reduction policies which have been employed in europe for years (and europe is pretty bad itself when it comes to energy use), but because the US energy industry funds american politicians (democrats and republicans) heavily, nothing ever gets done about it.
Myth #3: kyoto can't be realized without US cooperation
All that is needed is russia ratifying it, and putin recently said he will. So within a year kyoto will become active, if putin keeps his word that is.
Myth #4: kyoto is a tool for the rest of the world to "go after" america.
Kyoto is simply a tool to stop greenhouse gas levels from rising further, because they're already at the highest they've been in a million years, and if they rise much further dramatic climate change is inevitable. The cost of not doing anything far outweighs the cost of preventing it. The last time there was this much carbondioxide in the atmosphere, there were no polar ice caps. The sad thing about kyoto is that it was watered down significantly to be palatable to the US, and still america broke its word and didn't ratify it.
Myth #5: the only countries to join kyoto are those that have petty political reasons
Right now, 126 nations have joined kyoto (and not just signed the treaty). This is the vast majority of the planet, if measured in population (but sadly, without the US and russia, not in pollution).
Re:Johannesburg glowing (Score:1, Insightful)
Your surprised because? (Score:2, Insightful)
2. You didn't realize that color coded pictures of gases says nothing about the source of a gas, even if you were to blame it on humans based on someone's unchecked assertion.
Hate to argue, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
So while the study produced an interesting picture that shows something, maybe, by not scaling it properly, the entire thing useless.
NO2 by the way only means that nitrogen and oxygen were mixed at high temperature. Cars are the most common source of NO2 pollution. Industrial pollution is much better measured by different chemicals.
Re:And not only that... (Score:3, Insightful)
Quantities will still be far less than the wastes (and other environmental disruption) caused by coal mining and oil drilling and shipping of both substances. I agree that with any form of mining, you have a negative environmental impact; it's just that I rarely see people appreciating exactly how much less material is needed.
I'm also amused by listing sodium chloride as a contaminant. While it will cause problems with the local environment, calling it "salt" would put things like its relative toxicity in perspective.
Not if you consider the small percentage of the heat energy at the power plant being converted to electricity.
Apparently I should have put the sentences about production of electricity causing it to cost more per delivered joule in bold caps, because you're the third person who seems to have missed it.
Re:I'm not suprised, because I have a clue (Score:4, Insightful)
Bullshit. China is almost assured of being a raging economic success at this point, as long as they can keep a handle on their raging growth. You specifically mentioned them, and tried to dismiss them, because they derail your whole "Freedom and Democracy = "Wealth" theory. Singapore is another raging financial success and they aren't a towering symbol of freedom either.
The U.S.S.R's major economic failing was they chose economic isolation, and the west obliged and economically isolated them. They also impaled themselves on a misguided war in Afghanistan, a quagmire very similar to Vietnam and the new Iraq.
China astutely figured out they had lots of the thing Capitalis want most, cheap, oppressed, well educated labor. Rather than fighting the West like the U.S.S.R they threw their doors open and hung out a welcome sign. Capitalists can't tear down their factories in the West and ship them to China fast enough.
China is almost certain to surpass the U.S. as the world's economic superpower unless something cataclysmic happens, especially if the U.S. keeps its head up its ass and keeps handing all its capital and IP over to China.
"Rising standards of living solve most of the pressing problems facing the world today."
Excepting of course energy consumption and pollution.
"Wealthy/Free nations don't tend to make war on each other."
No but they do make war on poor nations especially ones they want to turn in to colonies, reference the British empire, the French empire, the German empire, the American empire(formally dominating the Phillipines and the entire Western Hemisphere and now moving to Asia and the Middle East.
Its a lot easier to be a "free/wealthy" nation when you are looting poor third world nations where you've installed dictators who do your bidding.
"Wealthy nations don't tend to produce terrorists either."
Saudi Arabia is a very wealthy nation, though the wealth is poorly distributed, and it produced most of the 9/11 hijackers.
See what you want to see? (Score:4, Insightful)
First, I don't see how anyone can look at that map and claim Europe has more pollution than the US. C'mon, are you... visually deaf? Use a ruler if it needs be, but please take a close look. I understand that the 1st map being zoomed in can play a role in there, but please, just put it in perspective. The blob just above Italy is about 1/6 size of the one above the US, while the other large blob in Europe is about 1/5th that of the north american one. I mean... c'mon...
Second, bear in mind that NO2 is by far not the only polluting agent that human activity sends into the atmosphere - and it's not the only one that is nocious. It does cause O3 to build up, which would be a good thing in the upper layers of the atmosphere but deadly and poisonous at human-reachable levels (ever noticed there are pool-cleaning systems that use O3 (ozone) instead of clorum?
I urge the 1st poster to really go and revisit that link and read the whole article, and actually examine the map in comparable zoom factors. And yes, that's China and not Russia, like another not-so-geographically-challenged reader pointed out.
I did like that comment about industry from more advanced countries fleeing to China where regulations are not as harsh - food for thought. I suppose it's ok if we go and poison other countries to protect our way of life.
Re:all the pollution activist in the US are pointl (Score:3, Insightful)
Lots of pollution over the US. Lots over Europe. Lots over Japan. Less over less-developed nations. How much of that is because the industries are located there, and not in the other nations? Some of these industries require a lot of electricity, and so are difficult to place in other countries. Those areas export to the less-developed nations. Rich providing goods for poor. Now do you get my point?
Re:And not only that... (Score:3, Insightful)
Who said anything about it being too cheap to meter? We're talking about feasably replacing gasoline and coal with nuclear, not making energy free. Indeed it could be cheaper, but it wouldn't be free.
Electric heat, no; very inefficient. Ground source heat-pumps, yes.
Inefficient, yes, but better than burning oil or natural gas in every house? Debatable. It certainly less poluting and almost certainly less expensive than coal or gas in the long term. It's also likely better than trucking hydrogen around as the parent to my comment suggested.
Too many people look to still-developing technologies to solve our energy problems. The problem with that is that there's always something better on the horizon so you're continually chasing a moving target, and using technology that isn't ready taints the public's perception of that technology in the future. Solar is a perfect example of this. Lots of people added solar to their houses in the '80s and now they, and anybody that knows them, wouldn't touch solar with a 10 foot pole (not to mention the fact that 20 years later it's still not quite ready). Nuclear technology is mature and ready to solve our current energy problems *today* with practically no additional development. In 20 years when the technology that seems promising now, but it a little bit out of reach is mature we can switch if it's enough of an improvement.
Re:Take note (Score:5, Insightful)
US population (2004/07 est.): 293,027,571
China population (2004/07 est.): 1,298,847,624
US population growth (2004 est.): 0.92%
China population growth (2004 est.): 0.57%
US industrial production growth (2003 est.): 0.3%
China industrial production growth (2003 est.): 30.4%
US GDP per-capita (2003 est.): 37,800 USD
China GDP per-capita (2003 est.): 5,000 USD
US GDP real growth rate (2003 est.): 3.1%
China GDP real growth rate (2003 est. official data): 9.1%
US electricity consumption (2001): 3.602 trillion kWh
China electricity consumption (2001): 1.312 trillion kWh
US oil consumption (2001 est.): 19.65 million bbl/day
China oil consumption (2001 est.): 4.57 million bbl/day
US natural gas consumption (2001 est.): 640.9 billion m^3
China natural gas consumption (2001 est.): 27.4 billion m^3
How long do you think it will take China to catch up with the US? How much energy will China be using then? How much pollution will China be creating then?
And, as an aside:
US GDP (2003 est.): 10.99 trillion USD
China GDP (2003 est.): 6.449 trillion USD
US current trade account balance (2003): -541.8 billion USD
China current trade account balance (2003): 31.17 billion USD
How long will it take the US to go totally bankrupt?
A little education (Score:2, Insightful)
The reason you don't see more blobs over the US is because we have the most stringent atmospheric pollution laws on the planet. Cars in the US are held to the strictest standards in the world for NOx emissions, as are most newer industrial installations. You see a bunch of crap over the northeast because this is where the industrial revolution started, and there are STILL old plants there that are not covered by the new laws - and it's amazing how far companies will go to keep those plants going to avoid having to comply with the new laws (which are very expensive). In fact, the entire northern half of New Jersey, quite possibly the smelliest, dirtiest place on the planet, is home to some of the oldest industrial plants in the country.
Why are you surprised to see a red blob almost completely covering the populated regions of China? China has no emissions laws, and no environmental policy to speak of (or human rights, or IP rights, or any other rights for that matter), so it shouldn't be surprising to see pollution there.