Here at Inhabitat we know there are a lot of green haters out there in the world — those who don’t believe global warming is real and think nothing of destroying the environment. Well, here’s a story that might get them to change their minds. The California Air Resources Board just released a comprehensive study that shows that particle pollution — air pollution from vehicles, machinery and buildings — is responsible for at least 9,000 premature deaths each year in California. So, greener technology like EV’s and renewable energy won’t just save the Golden state’s environment – it could actually save Californians’ lives.
California’s major metropolises — and some of their lesser metropolises — often have air pollution levels above that which the federal government deems safe. The particle pollution in California is visible most days as a creamy gray haze that hangs over its most populated areas. The smog is caused by emissions from vehicles, gas fed machinery, manufacturing plants and oil refineries. Though the California government is trying to get their state on the fast track to a green future, it seems they aren’t going fast enough. Imagine if their clogged roadways were covered in EV’s instead of diesel vehicles. The air would be crystal clear — oh the vision!
“This study is further evidence that we are on the right track, and ARB will continue to work with truckers and equipment owners to clean up diesel emissions, improve our air quality and protect public health,” said California Air Resource Board Chairman Mary Nichols in response to the study. The US Environmental Protection Agency requires the State of California to asses their air quality every 5 years and this study came out of their desire to discover the impacts of their poor air quality on the California population. The EPA has recently been trying — and sometimes succeeding — to pass regulations that would limit emissions from large polluters, like power plants, by enforcing green retrofits on their emission-laden buildings. EPA regulations like these should help California get on the track to lower the amount of deaths — 9,000! — each year, but a full green retrofit for the state seems like the best way to go.
+ Read the Study
Via Autoblog Green
The USA gov’s National Climatic Data Center has a cool website (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/cag3/na.html) that permits one to graph temperature trends in the USA. If you plot the temp trends for the contiguous USA from 1998 until now, you will see that the trend is downward at the rate of about 1 degree per decade. Temps have been declining, not warming, for the last 12 years. Go check it out for yourself. The data is from the USA weather satellites which is the most accurate temperature collection system in the world.
Climate scientists are certain that doubling CO2 in the atmosphere directly increases climate temp by a little more than 1 degree C. This raise in temp has a variety of feedbacks (both negative and positive) that are still being studied. For example, one feedback is that as temp goes up, humidity goes up, and the atmosphere stores more energy (it is effectively hotter). Another feedback is that more clouds are produced and these clouds bounce sunlight back to space (which cools things down). Another feedback when it gets hotter is that more thunderstorms occur, which also cools things down. Feedbacks are very, very complex and not well understood. The last IPCC report stated quite clearly that most climate feedbacks are poorly understood.
Currently CO2 is going up 2 ppm per year and the CO2 level is slightly under 400 ppm. At these rates it will take about 2 centuries to raise the temp about 1 degree C! Raising CO2 levels does increase temps but very, very, very slowly. CO2 is just one of many factors (and a small one at that) that determine our climate.
Saying that people who are skeptical that CO2 is causing catastrophic global warming effects are haters, you demonstrate a profound lack of knowledge about climate science. BTW, CO2 is not a pollutant, does not hurt people and is great for plants. When high tech green houses want plants to grow fast, they raise the CO2 level.