"Space Sensors Show Massive Surge In Chinese Air Pollution"

                                  1 September 2005
An optical Envisat view of haze over China, from a MERIS Reduced Resolution mode image acquired 4 October 2004. Credits: ESA

TerraDaily your portal to Earth reports yesterday, 9/1/05, in an article entitled "Space Sensors Show Massive Surge In Chinese Air Pollution":

The world's largest amount of the smog gas nitrogen dioxide (NO2) is hanging over Beijing and northeast China, according to images released by the European Space Agency (ESA) on Thursday.

Levels of NO2, a pollutant released by factories, power plants and vehicle exhausts, have risen by about 50 percent over China over the past decade as a result of spectacular economic growth and are continuing to increase, ESA said.

By comparison, concentrations of NO2 have remained steady or declined over industrial parts of the United States and eastern Europe, ESA said.

Exposure to NO2 in large quantities is known to cause lung damage and respiratory problems.

The gas is also a major ingredient of smog, the ground-level pollutant typically caused by interaction between sunlight and traffic pollution.

     Another illustration of why the Senate, on a unanimous vote, rejected the Kyoto Protocol--which China will not sign.  For the Unites States to make any difference in pollution levels under Kyoto, we would have to reduce economic activity by such a huge magnitude that such reduction would result in a depression.  The human suffering thereby caused might make global-warming worries seem like a picnic.

Comments

[Nene]

I was also very concerned about the beaibs drowning. Most of the time the ad was was playing I was marveling that the beaibs could swim so well. Then I wondered if I could find baby swimming lessons in my area for my little guy. Pollution? Clean water? Totally trumped by magical swimming beaibs.