Discourse for all interested in all things air-quality related
“Dedicated high-speed rail dollars kept in the Valley will simply go farther,” the Air Quality Matters blog post of Jun. 14th, showed how $4.2 billion in state rail bonds, in being applied to construction work in California’s San Joaquin Valley, could be a tremendous asset where hiring, stimulating local economies and improving area and state … Read more
This June 16th marks five years since construction on California’s statewide high-speed rail program first began. There are now 4,000 laborers doing bullet-train-related building work in the Golden State’s Central Valley at over three dozen sites. That level of commitment notwithstanding, there are those who think that they know what’s best regarding where yet-unspent dedicated … Read more
Natural gas. It is used to dry our clothes, cook our food, heat our water and warm our homes. All true. But, from an air quality standpoint, how clean-burning or unhealthy are the gas-fired appliances that we use? Many, apparently, just don’t make the grade. As far as unhealthy indoor air quality from natural gas-powered … 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
So, let’s explore this idea some more. Part 1 can be read here. Speaking of which, in the earlier installment it was duly pointed out that sold in the U.S. each year are approximately 17 million new cars with at least 850,000 of those, or five percent, being of the zero-emissions-vehicle variety. Post-pandemic, will that … Read more
The below Apr. 28, 2020 press release is from Earthjustice. Today the California Air Resources Board (CARB) released an updated draft of the nation’s first electric truck standard. The rule asks manufacturers to build zero-emission vehicles that would help strengthen public health in vulnerable communities, and is key to tackling California’s longstanding air quality crisis. … 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
In California’s expansive and agriculturally conducive San Joaquin Valley, encompassing eight counties in all, one-in-five children is an asthmatic. According to the California High-Speed Rail Authority highlighting childhood health and freight and passenger train transport and travel in a media release expresses that in the Valley the childhood asthma rate is better than double the … 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
It is no surprise that news of the Trump administration’s action to loosen the U.S.’s clean car standards would spark criticism, outcry, response. As the Environmental Protection Network noted, “‘The Trump administration’s rollback of President Obama’s historic Clean Car Standards is an environmental and economic disaster,’ said EPN member Jeff Alson, who served as a … Read more