Discourse for all interested in all things air-quality related
According to the California Environmental Protection Agency Air Resources Board (CARB), 80 percent of all of the state’s air-pollutant emissions and around half of all greenhouse-gas emissions (if those from the production of motor vehicle fuels are included) are emitted from the transportation sector. Yeah, 50 percent of all state-emitted GHG emissions is a significant … Read more
(The below Aug. 1, 2022 press release is from the Center for Biological Diversity.)* Community and conservation groups and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management reached an agreement today to suspend new oil and gas leasing across more than 1 million acres of public lands in California’s Central Valley and Central Coast. A separate agreement … Read more
(Ed. note: On occasion, when bringing to one’s attention the premise that polluted air can damage human health as well as having the potential to cause death in living, breathing beings, there were also times when I said air pollution can be detrimental to crop, plant and tree health. In the Vegetable Growers News article … Read more
The United States emits something on the order of 14 percent of all global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from human-influenced causes. Suffice it to say humans are responsible for 50 billion tons (50 gigatons or Gt) of GHGs that enter the atmosphere yearly, America’s GHG contribution being approximately 7 Gt annually. Meanwhile, in California, in … Read more
The below Jul. 19, 2022 press release is from the Environmental Defense Fund.* Clean hydrogen is increasingly seen by governments and industry as the Holy Grail of climate-friendly energy solutions, with vast sums flowing into this emerging sector. But a new study warns that hydrogen is a leak-prone gas with a potent warming effect that … Read more
The three most talked about topics in the current news cycle are: weather; public health and/or public safety; and the economy. These topics can be further divided into sub-categories: Floods, droughts and heat for weather; reproductive rights, and COVID-19 and the monkey pox viruses related to public health and/or public safety; and where the economy … Read more
Everyone and their sibling in the field of climate science it seems having anything and everything to do with searching for the end all, be all with regard to course-correcting, anthropogenically-prompted global warming and climate change, is looking for that one silver bullet. As far as I know, no one has yet to find this … Read more
National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA’s) James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), at 1 million miles distant from Earth (and in orbit just like the Earth around the sun), is beaming back remarkable images from deep in space: galaxies, nebulas, stars and more. I’ve seen some of those images and the detail is stunning! Within the … Read more
Wow! You look at any number of today’s hot-button issues – women’s reproductive and voting rights; those surrounding the supply chain slowdown; high gas prices; unemployment; and even those dealing with inflation – and in this mid-term election year, the question is: What will it take to get these problems solved? Obviously, there are fixes … Read more
So, I’ve been paying very close attention to the travel news and, in particular, that part dealing with statistics and here is what I’ve learned: For travel this weekend connected with the Independence Day holiday, Americans traveling out-of-town number 48 million; those hitting the roadways journeying 50 or more miles, 42 million or 87.5 percent; … Read more