#air pollution

[multiplevampyr]

actually i don’t really care about “women supporting women” when the woman in question has more carbon dioxide emissions than 14 households put together. the damn woman pretty much takes a jet to get from her bedroom to her kitchen. die perhaps.

[animentality]

[thoughtportal]

streets with rain gardens and streets without

[reasonsforhope]

hey, how do you cope with people saying we only have a small amount of time left to stop the worst effects of climate change? no matter how hopeful and ok i am, that always sends me back into a spiral :(

A few different ways

1. The biggest one is that I do math. Because renewable energy is growing exponentially

Up until basically 2021 to now, all of the climate change models were based on the idea that our ability to handle climate change will grow linearly. But that's wrong: it's growing exponentially, most of all in the green energy sector. And we're finally starting to see proof of this - and that it's going to keep going.

And many types of climate change mitigation serve as multipliers for other types. Like building a big combo in a video game.

Change has been rapidly accelerating and I genuinely believe that it's going to happen much faster than anyone is currently predicting

2. A lot of the most exciting and groundbreaking things happening around climate change are happening in developing nations, so they're not on most people's radars.

But they will expand, as developing nations are widely undergoing a massive boom in infrastructure, development, and quality of life - and as they collaborate and communicate with each other in doing so

3. Every country, state, city, province, town, nonprofit, community, and movement is basically its own test case

We're going to figure out the best ways to handle things in a remarkably quick amount of time, because everyone is trying out solutions at once. Instead of doing 100 different studies on solutions in order, we get try out 100 (more like 10,000) different versions of different solutions simultaneously, and then figure out which ones worked best and why. The spread of solutions becomes infinitely faster, especially as more and more of the world gets access to the internet and other key infrastructure

4. There's a very real chance that many of the impacts of climate change will be reversible

Yeah, you read that right.

Will it take a while? Yes. But we're mostly talking a few decades to a few centuries, which is NOTHING in geological history terms.

We have more proof than ever of just how resilient nature is. Major rivers are being restored from dried up or dead to thriving ecosystems in under a decade. Life bounces back so fast when we let it.

I know there's a lot of skepticism about carbon capture and carbon removal. That's reasonable, some of those projects are definitely bs (mostly the ones run by gas companies, involving carbon credits, and/or trying to pump CO2 thousands of feet underground)

But there's very real potential for carbon removal through restoring ecosystems and regenerative agriculture

The research into carbon removal has also just exploded in the past three years, so there are almost certainly more and better technologies to come

There's also some promising developments in industrial carbon removal, especially this process of harvesting atmospheric CO2 and other air pollution to make baking soda and other industrially useful chemicals

As we take carbon out of the air in larger amounts, less heat will be trapped in the atmosphere

If less heat is trapped in the atmosphere, then the planet will start to cool down

If the planet starts to cool down, a lot of things will stabilize again. And they'll probably start to stabilize pretty quickly

[mapsontheweb]

Air pollution in Europe, 2000-2019 average.

[zinjanthropusboisei]

If you are on the East Coast and trying to figure out what all of these air quality warnings mean and what you should do, here is what the colors and corresponding AQI numbers mean. The updated AirNow map is at this link:

Edit: this was posted at 10:50am on June 6 2023 and the screenshots were taken around 9am.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Analysis of data gathered using cutting-edge methodology – including detailed satellite images and measurements from more than 1,400 ground monitoring stations – reveals a dire picture of dirty air, with 98% of people living in areas with highly damaging fine particulate pollution that exceed World Health Organization guidelines. Almost two-thirds live in areas where air quality is more than double the WHO’s guidelines.

[...]

“This is a severe public health crisis,” said Roel Vermeulen, a professor of environmental epidemiology at Utrecht University who led the team of researchers across the continent that compiled the data. “What we see quite clearly is that nearly everyone in Europe is breathing unhealthy air.”

[bodyunderconstruction]

Smoke from Canada

Please stay inside if you are sensitive to smoke

check your area for air quality:

PLEASE REBLOG AND SHARE MORE TIPS

I’m actively updating as of Wednesday Jun 7, 2023. Please check your local news stations and weather apps for information on your area.

Outside

If you have to go outside please wear a mask, have lots of sunscreen and drink water when available/needed. Stay in shade when walking. Wear light colors outside, avoid dark colors. Cloth Masks are cool but paint/filter masks are your best friend. If you have a inhaler just bring it with you everywhere! Inside

When inside don’t open windows and keep curtain closed to expel heat. Sandwiches and fruit are your friend. Cooking is far too hot. If you are about to run out of water fill tub with cold water and pray you have a good drain. Basements are your friend. DRINK WATER NOT SODA OR SPORTS DRINKS! Don’t use drier, use a clothes line if possible

Extra

if you are looking for shelter, Public libraries, coffee shops, grocery stores, anywhere thats air conditioned. Take anything you need but be SAFE

Did I mention water? Gatorade is fun but don’t drink caffeine.

If there’s no smoke in your area and you just need to cool down, open your window at night/early morning

|| Take it easy. No, easier than that. Aside from the mental toll the smoke and horrible weird light and the creepy red sun and the burning smell take on you, your body is just working way harder to do everything it normally does. You will be exhausted, you will be distracted, you will have headaches and you will struggle with basic tasks like "walking up stairs." Do not try to power through it. Cancel plans, reschedule appointments, do fewer errands or consolidate them into one trip.

Treat yourself like you have a cold. Plenty of fluids, stopping when you're tired, cough drops and eye drops for the painful throat and eyes, inhalers if you have one.

Spend as little time outside as you possibly can. This includes your pets. Do not open your windows, do not open your screen door, do not run your AC (this is where some of the above advice for hot weather will come in handy.)

If you have to go outside, wear an N95 or KN95 mask. Make sure it's well-fitted around your face. You're not trying to keep out the smoke, but the PM2.5 (particulate matter 2.5 microns or smaller.) That's the stuff that causes cancer. If you have a fan with a HEPA filter, blast it all the time. If you don't have one go look at diy air filter link below, ask a mutual aid center if you cannot come into contact with these materials. || These tips are from them, a few links below are from them too so go give them some love. https://www.tumblr.com/salteywater

LINKS:

Diy Air Filter

Smoke Tips & Safety

Google Docs, being updated currently

Diy Sun Reflector

More tips

[gotham-ruaidh]

Actual photo of NYC right now

[allthecanadianpolitics]

An air-monitoring experiment found cancer-causing chemicals are polluting the entire city of Hamilton, Ont.

In the study, a concentration of benzo (a)pyrene — a carcinogenic chemical – in Hamilton exceeded the Ontario air quality guidelines.

“It’s about one cigarette per day that people are breathing in,” Matthew Adams, a University of Toronto associate professor and air-quality expert co-ordinating the study, said.

The research, led by the City of Hamilton and funded by Health Canada, has been underway for nearly two years. In that time, more than 60 air monitors have been attached to street poles in every ward to track air quality. A public town hall took place on Tuesday night to discuss the results.

Of note, benzo (a)pyrene, a chemical created when certain substances are not burned completely, was found across the city – not solely in areas near steel mills that commonly emit the cancer-linked chemicals. [...]

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[solarpunks]

A Liquid Tree? Scientists in Serbia Make Incredible Innovation

Dr. Ivan Spasojevic, Ph.D. in Biophysical sciences, and one of the authors on the project from the Institute for Multidisciplinary Research at the University of Belgrade, developed an innovative tool for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving air quality: the liquid tree. Also dubbed LIQUID 3, the novel creation is Serbia’s first urban photo-bioreactor, a solution in the fight for clean air. It contains six hundred litres of water and works by using microalgae to bind carbon dioxide and produce pure oxygen through photosynthesis.

The microalgae replace two 10-year-old trees or 200 square meters of lawn. . The advantage of microalgae is that it is 10 to 50 times more efficient than trees. 

Very interesting, especially in urban contexts that can’t support / be reconfigured to support more trees.

I imagine a Solarpunk world where each one of these is sculptural - a work of public art.

[thoughtportal]

[reasonsforhope]

"The last coal-fired power plant in New England, which had been the focus of a lawsuit and protests, is set to close in a victory for environmentalists.

Granite Shore Power said Wednesday it reached an agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency to close the Merrimack Station in New Hampshire by June 2028. As part of the deal, the company said the site will be turned into the state’s first renewable energy park that host solar power and battery storage systems. The company also said it would shutter Schiller Station in Portsmouth in December 2025. That facility, which is permitted to use oil, coal and biomass, has not operated for several years...

The 460-megawatt station in Bow has long been a thorn in the side of environmental groups. Most recently, the Sierra Club and the Conservation Law Foundation filed a lawsuit against plant owners, alleging it was violating the Clean Water Act. The plant was owned by Eversource until 2018, when it was sold to Connecticut-based Granite Shore Power. Both were named as defendants.

The environmental groups claimed the plant draws about 287 million gallons (1.1 billion liters) of water per day from the Merrimack River, heats that water as a result of its cooling process, and then discharges the water back into the river at temperatures that often exceed 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32 degrees Celsius).

Climate activists also protested the plant and demanded its closure over concerns it is a major source of air pollution. [Note: Coal plants are by definition major sources of air pollution. x] In one incident, climate activists last year paddled canoes and kayaks down the Merrimack River to the plant site and were arrested after going onto the property.

“This historic victory is a testament to the strength and resolve of those who never wavered in the fight for their communities and future,” Ben Jealous, Sierra Club Executive Director, said in a statement. “The people of New Hampshire and all of New England will soon breathe cleaner air and drink safer water.”

The Sierra Club said the announcement will make New Hampshire the 16th state that is coal-free and New England the second coal-free region in the country."

-via AP News, March 28, 2024

--

Note: It doesn't say it in this article, but the coal plants are being replaced by renewables! Specifically solar and battery farms! Source

[mapsontheweb]

Air pollution in Europe, 2000-2019 average.

[nemfrog]

Union Oil fire in San Pedro (Los Angeles). 1951. Los Angeles Examiner photo collection.

University of Southern California Collections