Category: Air Pollution
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Slowing Climate Change with Coastal Enhanced Weathering
Coastal enhanced weathering is a nature-based climate solution in which sand reacts with seawater to store more carbon in the oceans. It works in marine ecosystems by increasing pH and thus pushing the carbonate equilibrium forward. The result is that ocean water becomes less acidic and can absorb more atmospheric CO2. The enhanced weathering reaction…
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Are Millennials Saving the Planet with Anti-Car Attitudes?
Glowing, unmoving, beautiful, and toxic. These are the words used to describe California traffic in the Los Angeles Times, but essentially describes driving in cities anywhere. Public officials want people to buy more cars while somehow using them less. It’s no wonder millennials appear to have a lack of excitement about driving compared to earlier,…
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Fired Up About Fire
Watching the air outside my window cloud up with smoke, I felt like a cranky old neighbor. I debated whether or not to write about something as mundane as my neighbor’s choices, which would probably impact them more than me. The urge to educate the public through this environmental blog won out. If there is…
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Understanding Your Local Air Quality
These days, air quality information is so prevalent that it can be viewed alongside the daily weather on a phone or television. Satellite data can be accessed through the internet to evaluate air quality on a broader scale regardless of where one is on the globe. One thing that stands in the way, other than…
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When Pollution Makes It All the Way to the Supreme Court
The Clean Air Act (CAA) of 1970 was a major environmental turning point in the United States which was successful in lowering emissions and increasing air quality. The CAA created: specific rules regarding the creation and adoption of national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) emissions standards for new sources and mobile sources hazardous air pollution…
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Recessions are a Second Chance to Divest
Did you know that fossil fuels in the US are subsidized? The reason for this is that the domestic American fossil fuel market was once young and unstable, though since then it has ballooned into a mature, lucrative business. The federal government’s financial support of coal, oil, and natural gas guaranteed cheap and plentiful energy…
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The Wonderful World of SODAR
This post took me ALL DAY but I am so proud of it! Watch a vid of SODAR on my blog
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Urban Heat Islands
A number of my friends decided to visit the beautiful island of Hawaii this month. Daydreaming about spending time on the beach or hiking Oahu’s “Stairway to Heaven” made me think about a different kind of island: The Urban Heat Island. Urban heat islands aren’t literal islands, though. Certain cities are referred to as urban…
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Let Me Breathe: Things I Didn’t Know About Indoor Air
An article published in the Journal of Physiological Anthropology showed that people felt “comfortable, soothed, and natural” after potting plants and had lower diastolic blood pressure compared to when they carried out computer-related tasks. Not only have plants been linked to an improved mood, but also they are known to improve indoor air quality. Here…
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What the Flux
Climate change and world record atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are not new topics in mainstream media. An ample source of information on the planet’s current and future conditions is at our fingertips, but a resounding question from curious minds and climate-change deniers alike is: How do we know the climate is changing? We might have a…
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