Atmospheric
New research, reported this week in the online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, finds that coal burning, primarily in North America and Europe, contaminated the Arctic and potentially affected human health and ecosystems in and around Earth's polar regions.
The study, titled "Coal Burning Leaves Toxic Heavy Metal Legacy in the Arctic," was conducted by the Desert Research Institute (DRI), Reno, Nev. and partially funded by the National Science Foundation.
Detailed measurements from a Greenland ice core showed pollutants from burning coal--the toxic heavy…
If you live in Spain, you may have felt like some weather occurred on a predictable cycle, even a weekly one. And if you are below a certain age, you may even have been planning your seasonal activities around it your whole life.
You aren't alone. Arturo Sanchez-Lorenzo of the University of Barcelona and colleagues from the University of Girona, the University of Valencia and the University of Augsburg have thought the same thing.
Writing in Geophysical Research Letters, they detail their study of Spain during the 1961–2004 period. To minimize the impact of local variables, they used 13…
Researchers have discovered an unusual molecule that is essential to the atmosphere's ability to break down pollutants, especially the compounds that cause acid rain. It's the unusual chemistry facilitated by this molecule, however, that will attract the most attention from scientists.
Somewhat like a human body metabolizing food, the Earth's atmosphere has the ability to "burn," or oxidize pollutants, especially nitric oxides emitted from sources such as factories and automobiles. What doesn't get oxidized in the atmosphere falls back to Earth in the form of acid rain.
Scientists at Purdue…
Some climate models have predicted that global warming will increase the intensity of extreme precipitation events but a new study conducted at the University of Miami and the University of Reading (U.K.) says their observational evidence confirms the link between a warmer climate and more powerful rainstorms.
It's no more scientifically accurate to imply this year's floods were caused by or made worse by global warming than it was for Al Gore to imply global warming caused Hurricane Katrina but there is no question more intense rain events increase the risk of flooding and can have…
Acid rain from atmospheric pollution can reduce methane emissions from rice paddies by up to 24 per cent according to research led by Dr Vincent Gauci of The Open University. This is potentially a beneficial side effect of the high pollution levels China - the world’s largest producer of rice - is often associated with. Methane is 21-23 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas than CO2.
“The reduction in pollution happens during a stage of the lifecycle when the rice plant is producing grain. This period is normally associated with around half of all methane emissions from rice and we found…
Rapid natural climate change was happening 12,700 years ago, write geoscientists who say they have proved for the first time that an extremely fast climate change happened in Western Europe long before man-made changes in the atmosphere, and is causatively associated with a sudden change in the wind systems.
Achim Brauer, Peter Dulski and Jörg Negendank, (emeritus Professor) from the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Gerald Haug from the DFG-Leibniz Center for Surface Processes and Climate Studies at the University of Potsdam and the ETH in Zurich, and Daniel Sigman from the…
UPDATE: See a video clip here
Total solar eclipses take place when the Earth, Moon and Sun are aligned and the shadow of the Moon touches the surface of the Earth. At mid-eclipse, observers within the lunar shadow briefly see totality, where the silhouette of the Moon completely covers the Sun, revealing the beautiful outer solar atmosphere or corona.
On August 1st, 2008 there will be a total eclipse visible from Canada, northern Greenland, Svalbard, the Barents Sea, Russia, Mongolia and China.
People in the British Isles will see a partial solar eclipse, with between 1/10th and 1/3rd of…
An aerosol mass spectrometer developed by chemists from Aerodyne Research Inc. and Boston College is giving scientists who study airborne particles the technology they need to examine the life cycles of atmospheric aerosols – such as soot – and their impact on issues ranging from climate change to public health.
BC Chemistry Professor Paul Davidovits and Aerodyne Principal Scientist Timothy B. Onasch say their novel spectrometer allows researchers to better understand what happens to these sub-microscopic particles that can absorb and scatter light and influence the lifetime of clouds.
"For…
Scientists say they have found a workable way of reducing CO2 levels in the atmosphere by adding lime to seawater. And they think it has the potential to dramatically reverse CO2 accumulation in the atmosphere, reports Cath O’Driscoll in SCI’s Chemistry & Industry magazine published today.
Shell is so impressed with the new approach that it is funding an investigation into its economic feasibility. ‘We think it’s a promising idea,’ says Shell’s Gilles Bertherin, a coordinator on the project. ‘There are potentially huge environmental benefits from addressing climate change – and adding…
China is the largest polluter in the world and leads in greenhouse gas emissions but is exempt from the Kyoto Protocol. Many Western countries argue that all polluters should face restrictions if any do, but the US, for example, is the largest importer of goods from China.
Should importers of goods also be responsible for greenhouse gas emissions of goods?
The Kyoto Protocol had numerous flaws, based primarily on an inadequate understanding of which gases caused global warming and to what extent. Focusing solely on counting carbon emissions within national borders was also inadequate in…