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New analysis has found increasing emissions of several ozone-depleting chemicals despite their production being banned for most uses under the Montreal Protocol—and a loophole in the rules is likely responsible. According to the researchers, emissions from these CFCs currently do not significantly threaten ozone recovery.
Less traffic on the roads during the first COVID-19 lockdown in the UK led to a reduction in air pollution but may have caused potentially damaging surface ozone levels to rise, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of York. The problem is being created by the change in chemistry between NO x and O 3.
Ozone levels across much of North America and Europe dropped significantly between 2000 and 2014. People living in parts of southern Europe, South Korea and southern Japan and China also experienced more than 15 days a year of ozone levels above 70 ppb. Source: University of Leicester. Click to enlarge.
Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) and the Nanjing University of Information Science & Technology (NUIST), found that while PM 2.5 pollution is falling, harmful ground-level ozone pollution is on the rise, especially in large cities. But the rapid reduction of PM 2.5 Ke Li, Daniel J. 1812168116.
A study by an international team led by scientists at the University of East Anglia have identified four new man-made gases in the atmosphere, all of which are contributing to the destruction of the ozone layer. CFCs are the main cause of the hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica. Brenninkmeijer, Paul J. Oram, Claire E.
A University of Utah engineer has developed an inexpensive new method to remove oil sheen by repeatedly pressurizing and depressurizing ozone gas, creating microscopic bubbles that attack the oil so it can be removed by sand filters. Emerging contaminants, such as wastewater polluted with medications and personal care products.
Ozone, the main component of smog, is a plant-damaging pollutant formed by emissions from vehicles, cooking stoves and other sources. New research shows that ozone pollution damaged millions of tons of wheat, rice, soybean and cotton crops in India in 2005. Surface ozone pollution in India damaged 6 million metric tons (6.7
Exposure to ozone, long associated with impaired lung function, is also connected to health changes that can cause cardiovascular disease such as heart attack, high blood pressure and stroke, according to a new study of Chinese adults. The findings associated ozone exposure with markers of platelet activation and increased blood pressure.
The rapidly growing space industry may have a greater climate effect than the aviation industry and undo repair to the protective ozone layer if left unregulated, according to a new study led by UCL and published in the journal Earth’s Future as an open-access paper. The space industry is one of the world’s fastest growing sectors.
Springtime ozone distributions for 1984, 1995–2008 in the mid-troposphere (3.0–8.0 Springtime ozone levels above western North America are rising primarily due to air flowing eastward from the Pacific Ocean, a trend that is largest when the air originates in Asia. The US EPA recently proposed new tougher ground-level ozone standards.
The two combine in the atmosphere to make either nitric acid or peroxynitrous acid; the so-called branching ratio of these two chemicals is important in models of ozoneproduction. This means less of the hydroxyl radical and nitrogen dioxide go away, leading to proportionately more ozone, mostly in polluted areas, Okumura said.
Researchers at the University of Colorado, Boulder and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) modeled the emissions impact had plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) replaced light duty gasoline vehicles in the Denver, Colorado area in summer 2006. Ozone concentration increases were modeled for small areas near central Denver.
Dust, ozone and carbon can accumulate in valleys and basins in California and other Western states. When you buy a product at Wal-Mart, it has to be manufactured somewhere. The product doesn’t contain the pollution, but creating it caused the pollution. Jintai Lin of Beijing’s Peking University is the paper’s lead author.
Consumer products such as shampoo, cleaning products and paint now contribute as much to emitted volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in cities as tailpipe emissions from vehicles, according to a new study led by NOAA. 1A) and sales data of volatile chemical products. —McDonald et al.
Ozone pollution near Earth’s surface is one of the main ingredients of summertime smog. It is also not directly measurable from space due to the abundance of ozone higher in the atmosphere, which obscures measurements of surface ozone. —Jin et al.
The global market for rocket launches may require more stringent regulation in order to prevent significant damage to Earth’s stratospheric ozone layer in the decades to come, according to a new study by researchers in California and Colorado. Darin Toohey.
Researchers at the University of Vienna (Austria) have demonstrated that tire wear particle (TWP)-derived compounds are readily taken up by lettuce with measured maximum leaf concentrations between ∼0.75 Not only the parent compounds but also their transformation products, many of which are still unknown, may exert harmful effects on biota.
The first peer-reviewed study to directly quantify how emissions from oil and natural gas (O&NG) activities influence summertime tropospheric ozone (O 3 ) pollution in the Colorado Front Range confirms that chemical vapors from oil and gas activities are a significant contributor to the region’s chronic ozone problem.
Although halogens released from long-lived anthropogenic substances, such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), are the principal cause of the recent depletion of stratospheric ozone, recent observations show that very short-lived substances (VSLS), with lifetimes generally under six months, are also an important source of stratospheric halogens.
In a recent open-access paper published in ACS’ Environmental Science & Technology , researchers from the University of York report that alcohols in windshield washer fluid account for a larger fraction of real-world vehicle emissions than previous estimates have suggested. the products used for “car care,” such as windshield washer fluid.
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced $5,959,842 million in research funding to nine institutions to improve air quality models used to simulate ozone, particulate matter (PM), regional haze, air toxics, and emerging pollutants. It will also inform the development of strategies for improving air quality.
Researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) have performed life cycle assessments (LCA) of three batteries for plug-in hybrid (PHEV) and full performance battery electric (BEV) vehicles. Flow diagram of the battery system, defined by the functional unit of 50 MJ stored and delivered to the powertrain.
Tom Sharkey, chairperson of the Michigan State University biochemistry and molecular biology department, believes isoprene, a gas given off by plants to help them cope with rapid increases in temperature that can occur in sunlight. His team also has created models to measure how much isoprene plants release on a global scale.
Some of the substitutes for ozone-damaging chemicals that being phased out worldwide under international agreements are themselves potent greenhouse gases and contribute to warming. CF 4 was one of those breakdown products. We really need to understand the chemistry of the compounds we use.
VOCs and nitrogen oxides react with sunlight to form ground-level ozone, the main component of smog. De Gouw said the VOC emissions are likely generated by the production process, not the coal-burning that powers it. —Joost de Gouw. de Gouw et al.
VOCs, primarily emitted from the tailpipes of vehicles, are a key ingredient in the formation of ground-level ozone which, at high levels, can harm people’s lungs and damage crops and other plants. Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado Boulder.
Researchers at the University of California, Irvine and other institutions have conducted a statistical analysis of pollution exposure and yields from 1980 to 2015 on a key sector making up about 38% of the state’s total agricultural output: perennial crops such as almonds, grapes, nectarines, peaches, strawberries and walnuts.
According to a new study led by a team at Duke University, airborne particulate matter and dust are cutting solar photovoltaic energy output by more than 25% in certain parts of the world, with roughly equal contributions from ambient PM and PM deposited on photovoltaic surfaces. Credit: ACS, Bergin et al. Click to enlarge. 7b00197.
Now, researchers from Sandia National Laboratory’s Combustion Research Facility, the University of Manchester and the University of Bristol report in a paper in Science the first direct kinetics measurements made of reactions of any gas-phase Criegee intermediate, in this case formaldehyde oxide (CH 2 OO). —Welz et al.
The processes that create ozone pollution in the summer can also trigger the formation of wintertime air pollution, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder and NOAA, in partnership with the University of Utah. To combat wintertime PM 2.5
Nitrous oxide is a potent greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change and stratospheric ozone destruction. Rates of nitrous oxide production via denitrification in small streams increase with nitrate concentrations. —Jake Beaulieu of the University of Notre Dame and the US EPA, and lead author of the PNAS paper.
Among the non-CO 2 pollutants are hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), methane, tropospheric ozone, and black carbon soot. Reducing tropospheric ozone can improve public health as well as agricultural productivity. The next round of UN climate negotiations begins in Cancun today. million lives lost each year due to black carbon soot.
The University of Bremen is the scientific base of the international project known as EMeRGe (Effect of Megacities on the transport and transformation of pollutants on the Regional and Global scales). Burrows, the Principal Investigator of the mission and a professor at the Institute of Environmental Physics at the University of Bremen.
The Bakken Formation, a shale oil and gas field in North Dakota and Montana, is emitting roughly 2% (about 250,000 tons per year) of the globe’s ethane, according to new study led by researchers at the University of Michigan. Between 2005 and 2014, the Bakken’s oil production jumped by a factor of 3,500, and its gas production by 180.
eutrophication; ET = ecological toxicity; FEC = fossil energy consumption; WU = water use; LO = land occupation; “The rest” includes acidification; smog formation; ozone layer depletion; and human health effects. GW = global warming; Eut. Credit: ACS, Yang et al. Click to enlarge.
A multidisciplinary team of product developers, chemists and material scientists will work to discover new products for the US automotive, construction, sports and leisure industries. BASF has opened a new research lab for thermoplastic polyurethanes (TPU) in Wyandotte, Michigan.
Cooking, cleaning and other routine household activities generate significant levels of volatile and particulate chemicals inside the average home, leading to indoor air quality levels on par with a polluted major city, according to a study by researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder. Earlier post.).
Researchers at North Carolina State University are developing an ozone-based pre-treatment technique (ozonolysis) to release sugars from the energy grass miscanthus for production into renewable fuels or chemicals with minimal generation of chemical waste streams and degradation of the carbohydrate components.
Despite reports that global emissions of the potent greenhouse gas, HFC-23, were almost eliminated in 2017, an international team of scientists, led by the University of Bristol, has found atmospheric levels growing at record values. This gas has very few industrial applications. This would have been a big win for climate.
In addition to CO 2 , other compounds such as ozone (O 3 ) precursors (nitrogen oxides (NO x =NO+NO 2 ), carbon monoxide (CO), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs)) and aerosols such as black carbon (BC) and organic carbon (OC) are emitted by ships. 1 from shipping in 2007, corresponding to 3.3% 1 of the total ship emissions in 2007.
In the first empirical study using satellite measurements to explore the relationship between urban form and air pollution, a team from the University of Minnesota has found that cities with highly contiguous built-up areas have, on average, lower concentrations of nitrogen dioxide (NO 2 , a key component of urban air pollution).
For unsaturated hydrocarbons—molecules with at least one C=C double bond—a prominent removal mechanism is reaction with ozone, called ozonolysis. Earlier post.). Hydrocarbons that are emitted into Earth’s troposphere, either naturally or by humans, are removed by many reactive atmospheric species.
related damages, researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and Stanford have found that, US-economy-wide, gross external damage (GED) due to premature mortality has decreased by more than 20% from 2008 to 2014. Four sectors, comprising less than 20% of the national gross domestic product (GDP), are responsible for ?75%
Researchers at Tohoku University in Japan have identified a way to reduce harmful NO emissions produced by ammonia fuel during combustion. Production plants already exist because ammonia is widely used in fertilizers. The process involves swirling the gas with air as part of the power generation process.
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