Discourse for all interested in all things air-quality related
Astounding it is how on a gallon of diesel a ton of railroad-hauled freight on average can be transported a distance of approximately 470 miles. Pretty remarkable stuff! Even more remarkable, substituting diesel with electric propulsion and the fuel-efficiency numbers for train-hauled freight (and passengers) look even better, and even more impressive still, when that … Read more
Whether we are talking about atmospheric normalization or global warming’s and/or climate change’s causation, “balance” is the word. That’s right, balance. So in a kind of holistic air-healing sense or maybe more precisely, a holistic air-remedying context, what does being balanced mean exactly? From physics, we know that if an object exerts a force opposite … Read more
The past four or five years are unquestionably among the hottest in history ever recorded: An oft-repeated message and a condition personally witnessed and attested to by myriad people. If world warming of late seems unprecedented that’s because it is. So, too, it would appear is air-pollution-contributed premature death: 7 million worldwide annually according to … Read more
Fooling with Mother Nature is almost certainly asking for trouble. Where this is going is nobody wants a planet that climate change-wise or temperature change-wise reaches the point of no return. If that happens, it’s theoretically curtains. But, don’t think for a second that humankind can’t change weather or climate. We can and have. Want … Read more
The below Jul. 16, 2020 press release is from the Center for Biological Diversity. A federal judge late yesterday reinstated the Bureau of Land Management’s 2016 methane waste rule, aimed at protecting people and the climate from methane waste and pollution from oil and gas extraction on public lands. The ruling is the third defeat … Read more
The below Jun. 3, 2020 press release is from the University of California at Berkeley. Living near active oil and gas wells may put pregnant people at higher risk of having low birth weight babies, especially in rural areas, finds a new study of birth outcomes in California. The study, funded by the California Air … Read more
The below Apr. 15, 2020 press release from the Center for Biological Diversity. A federal judge today ruled that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers violated the law when it approved Nationwide Permit 12, a water-crossing permit critical for TC Energy’s Keystone XL tar sands pipeline and many other pipelines nationwide. The ruling invalidates Nationwide … Read more
Sometimes people mistake a locomotive for a train but there is no mistaking a train for a locomotive. And just like a locomotive isn’t a train and a train isn’t a locomotive, there should be no confusing steam with diesel-electric with diesel-hydraulic with straight electric with hydrogen (fuel-cell-electric) locomotive power. The type of energy supply … Read more
On Jan. 29, 2020 the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its Annual Energy Outlook 2020 report. Also known as the AEO2020, the outlook includes updated projections of future energy production and use in the United States. The below is from the Energy Information Administration’s Jan. 29, 2020 press release titled: “EIA’s Annual Energy Outlook … Read more
Is attacking dirty air from the grassroots level best or cleaning it using the top-down approach? The answer to this question is what we are right here, right now in search of. Each year once per year, representatives from hundreds of nations gather, the purpose of which is to come to agreement regarding identified climate … Read more