ScienceDaily. (2022, January 19). Air pollution significantly reduces pollination by confusing butterflies and bees. ScienceDaily. Retrieved February 6, 2022, from https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/01/220119194035.htm 

Research recently showed that air pollution may decrease pollination because insects will not be able to smell the crops and flowers that they need to pollinate. A study showed that there is about a 30% reduction in pollination if greenhouse gasses such as ozone are present. These pollutants probably change the scent on flowers, making them harder to detect. They are not only dangerous for humans, but also for our natural ecosystems. This also affects the world economically, given that insect pollination helps agriculture and crop species.

This article is interesting because it’s proof that air pollution does have other consequences than just making it harder to breathe. Animals that heavily rely on their sense of smell to live their daily lives will be in trouble, affecting their life and their role within the ecosystem. One of the most vital roles that would be affected is the pollinators, where research has shown that pollination is decreased where there is pollution in the air. This could not only harm the ecosystem, but also the world’s economy, given its reliance on agriculture and food production. While people do have different priorities, for example their job or their family, there is a reason for taking action for every single one of their priorities. Therefore there’s no more excuses to be made. It will be these next 50 years that decides the future of this planet: there is a real climate crisis.

Poon, L. (2021, September 1). Air Pollution From Fossil Fuels Could Cut Lifespans by 2 to 5 Years. Bloomberg.com. Retrieved February 6, 2022, from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-09-01/measuring-the-human-cost-of-global-air-pollution 

The most dangerous type of pollutant is PM2.5, which could potentially cost the average person 2.2 years of age off their life. A report found that air pollution is actually more dangerous than other health risks like smoking, unsafe water, etc. However, the policies getting introduced to solve climate change do have the ability to reverse this lifetime cost. The WHO guidelines have potential to add up to 5 years onto someone’s life. While developed countries have the ability to spend money on policies to help this problem, developing nations face budgets and other difficulties that could prevent them from truly making an impact.

Similar to the other articles, this article uses information from The World Health Organization and the new guidelines they set up to improve the air quality. This new research, along with the guidelines, is essential, given that it is up to date and has the ability to vastly improve the air quality. The fact that it could potentially add years to someone’s life is crazy, and should be an incentive for people to take action. Finding the right things to say to people to get them to take action is critical, given that without everyone’s help, nothing will change. It cannot become a “Tragedy of the Commons” situation, where people slack off because others are “doing enough.” The importance of policies and other mitigation techniques is increasing, as we are officially in uncharted territory with our ppm over 400. While coming up with solutions for our own countries, it is also important to consider developing countries that may require assistance in order to adopt similar policies.

Keller, J. C. (2022, January 9). Understanding air pollution from space. MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Retrieved February 6, 2022, from https://news.mit.edu/2022/understanding-air-pollution-from-space-arlene-fiore-0109 

The air quality right now isn’t giving life when you breathe, but instead taking it away. Air pollution will be causing many deaths in the future if air pollution doesn’t start to improve. A few of the key pollutants are sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, ozone, and nitrogen dioxide. Being able to identify ozone trends and understanding how they form will help us come up with solutions for how to improve air quality. The data they’re gathering can be used to estimate the benefits and disadvantages of governmental investments.

I believe that the data part of researching these types of problems is essential. Without the data, people may not believe how bad the crisis truly is. The data is genuine evidence that there will not only be human deaths if the air pollution continues, but also overall vast environmental damage to all organisms. People need to learn to work with the data in order to find solutions that fit the scale of how “far to reach.” In other words, how many steps are crucial in the changing of one’s daily life in order to better the air pollution and how far do we have to go as a community to improve our habits. This scale can only be established through data and problem-solving. Countries have to team up together; not one independent country can make a great enough difference on its own. If people are able to see the data and understand it, we will have a better shot at convincing them to take action.

Hasenkopf, C. (2021, October 12). Air pollution is a major global health threat – why don’t we treat it like one? TheHill. Retrieved February 6, 2022, from https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/576426-air-pollution-is-a-major-global-health-threat-why-dont-we-treat-it 

The number of people dying from bad air quality will be more than the number dying from COVID-19. Most deaths from air pollution will occur in middle- and low- income countries. While many people working for the government want to implement new policies to help the environment and the air pollution, they have specific guidelines that prevent them from spending too much money or time on certain subjects or topics. Even though Biden has pushed to instate policies to reduce pollutants globally, it was not done so for public health. Similarly, the international development community hasn’t taken much action concerning air pollution and the effect it will have on the environment and public health.

According to this article, even if people “want” to take action, that doesn’t mean they do. People still have trouble putting the needs of the environment high on the priority list for countries and organizations as a whole. Even though it’s critical to acknowledge the environmental problems, it won’t mean anything significant unless people have a “call to action” and start taking steps to help. The fact that the government was so worried about the number of COVID-19 deaths, when air pollution is causing more deaths overall, says something about the level of concern about air pollution. If we do not decrease combustion levels and start to take steps to mitigate both climate change and air pollution, the role of the human population in the future will start to become unclear. Both Hasenkopf and I believe that government or international steps in the near future are necessary in order to prevent further air pollution damage.

Dellatto, M. (2021, September 28). Global air pollution more dangerous than thought, who reports. Forbes. Retrieved February 6, 2022, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisadellatto/2021/09/22/global-air-pollution-more-dangerous-than-thought-who-reports/ 

Air pollution, according to The World Health Organization, is much more dangerous to people than we have realized. Using the new guidelines, which include lowering the amount of combustion of ozone, nitrogen dioxide, etc., could not only save many people’s lives, but could also be very positive for the environment. The WHO director believes that the best way to improve the air quality and air pollution is for all countries to ban together “protect our environment.” Investing in these new guidelines will save around 80% of deaths by PM2 particles.

This article is overall concerning, given that our global combustion output is much higher than our intake. The extra 10 GtC’s per year of carbon, along with other greenhouse gasses, is worsening our air pollution. If The World Health Organization has done enough research to believe that these new guidelines will work, I believe that they will. However, with that being said, implementing these guidelines will be difficult. No business will be able to “turn the switch off” and decrease their output exponentially, since that will destroy the economy. Finding ways to slowly decrease the output is the best solution. Air pollution is not only bad for humans, but for other plants and animals. Not only do we want to better the air pollution, but also to better climate change overall. To do so, both mitigation and adaptation are necessary, in addition to all countries working together.

Matthews, Dylan. “How Humans Could Live Two Years Longer.” Vox, Vox, 27 Dec. 2021, https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/22691558/air-pollution-deaths-mortality-pm-25-soot-particulate. 

In late December of 2021, the news source Vox posted an article authored by Dylan Matthews entitled, How humans could live two years longer. This article provides staggering statistics on the mortality-related effects of our air pollution crisis. A shocking 90% of all humans live in areas where the air pollution is worse than the WHO (World Health Organization), suggests. The article also includes a study from the University of Chicago that has concluded that air pollution takes an average of 2.2 years of somebody’s life. This makes air pollution according to the study, nearly three times more deadly than the use of alcohol, drugs, and unsafe water, five times more deadly than contracting HIV or Aids, and 114 times more deadly than global conflicts and terrorism. Health is obviously not the only bad thing that results from air pollution, but when it is taking more than two years of everyone’s lives, it is.

I have focused primarily on air pollution’s effects on health instead of on the environment because I think that in the end, the health of humanity outweighs all other variables when it comes to air pollution. The WHO and this article have made it extremely clear that we are in fact killing ourselves when it comes to climate change. I picked this article to go last because it sums up the whole of the problem related to health but also presents staggering and motivating statistics on what will happen if we truly can combat climate change. If we reduce air pollution, which is a significant contributor to climate change, and keep global warming under 2 celsius, we can avert nearly 200 million early deaths over the next 80 years. 200 million! The problem is massive, but climate change sooner or later is going to be the biggest killer of Americans. U.S. policy regarding air pollution has already worked as the article notes. The clean air act was passed in the early 1970s and saw the infant mortality rate in the United States sharply decline. It is estimated that 1,300 infants would have died in 1972 had it not been for the passage of the clean air act during that year. If we have already saved lives, what is to say that we cannot save more, with the Biden administration’s goal to cut PM 2.5 by over 30% in the coming years, I am confident that with the right goals, policy, and motivation we can save ourselves from our own wrongdoings.

Shi, Liuhua, et al. “A National Cohort Study (2000–2018) of Long-Term Air Pollution Exposure and Incident Dementia in Older Adults in the United States.” Nature News, Nature Publishing Group, 19 Nov. 2021, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-27049-2. 

In mid-November, 2021, the scientific journal Nature published an article about the links between air pollution and dementia over an 18 year period from 2000-to 2018. The article is quite lengthy and contains many helpful statistics to understand the scope of America’s air pollution problem. A very interesting component of this research was mapped containing information on where the pollutants PM 2.5, O3, and NO2 are most prevalent. The data also shows that PM 2.5 is the pollutant that leads to the greatest chance of individuals developing dementia. The study also cross-referenced pollutant types with both Alzheimer’s and dementia and demographic factors like race.

This article from Nature was quite extensive and complicated to interpret. That being said, its main points regarding the indisputable link between memory-related diseases and air pollution, particularly PM 2.5. In addition, the data from these studies show that African Americans are the most prone to develop memory disorders as a result of air pollution. It also concluded that when compared to single and triple pollutants, bi-pollutants tend to be the most deadly. What I noticed three years ago when I visited Japan is that many elderly people wear masks on a regular basis. Obviously masking in the United States is not as popular, as shown by the reaction of many Americans to federal mask mandates throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, but until PM 2.5 concentrations significantly decrease along with other pollutants like O3 and NO2 which cause Alzheimer’s and dementia at a lesser rate than PM 2.5, but still cause it, elderly Americans should consider masking up for air pollution. It is devastating that this condition which used to be genetic is now being caused by humans. It is so much more than just a memory-related disease that will devastate the population in the coming decades if action is not taken immediately to curb air pollution. It is increasingly seeming like humanity’s effects on climate change will wipe out humankind instead of humans outliving the worst climate change has to offer.

EPA. “EPA to Evaluate Whether Lead Emissions from Piston-Engine Aircraft Endanger Human Health and Welfare.” EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, 12 Jan. 2022, https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-evaluate-whether-lead-emissions-piston-engine-aircraft-endanger-human-health-and. 

On January 12th, 2022, the Environmental Protection Agency published an article through their press office about piston engine aircraft and their contribution to air pollution and climate change. The agency announced that they are looking into possible links between the leaded fuel of piston engines and air pollution. Since the year 1980, the amount of lead in the air has decreased by 99%, but piston-engined aircraft still remains the nation’s largest source of lead emitters into the air. Lead poses significant harm to all humans regardless of age, and there is no identified amount of lead that can be tolerated by humans without it potentially causing harm to them. While airborne lead is a smaller problem than lead from other sources such as paint, the EPA still feels the need to do more research throughout 2022, and potentially present a plan to address this issue in 2023.

Air pollution is a big topic that needs to be solved by solving the smaller problems associated with it to be able to tackle the bigger ones. Replacing lead-based fuel, or retrofitting piston engines, is a doable solution to the problem of lead in our air. While the article did show that lead concentrations in the air have decreased by 99%, having any lead in the air is inexcusable and requires immediate action. Piston engine planes in America only make up 10% of planes in service but represent 40% of flight hours because these kinds of aircraft are typically used more intensely than others. I think this issue with piston-engine aircraft is a great example of something really solvable that will contribute to cleaner air. We need to have a goal of having zero pollutants in our air, and since we have decreased 99% of lead in the air, we should hurry up and make it 100%

Stack, Megan K. “The Soldiers Came Home Sick. The Government Denied It Was Responsible.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 11 Jan. 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/11/magazine/military-burn-pits.html. 

On January 11th, 2022, the New York Times published an article on their website by Meghan K Stack on U.S. service members getting sick from garbage disposal fires in warzones. This story was quite lengthy and went into great detail on the U.S. military’s handling of waste in warzones, and the effects that this had on soldiers. Essentially, any U.S. military personnel who had served on bases where trash was being burned, were exposed to lung diseases. This U.S. action of burning trash on bases has come under fire, especially from Joe Biden whose son died of cancer that now President Biden has linked to the burn pits his son was exposed to while serving in Iraq. Over recent years, burn pits have been used less and less, both at home and abroad on U.S. military bases, and currently, there is legislation in Congress to eliminate their use.

Soldiers already put themselves at risk by serving this nation in war zones. The fact that a soldier may survive deadly terrorism in Afghanistan but end up dying of lung cancer is appalling. Like other small problems regarding climate change, this one is incredibly solvable. Because of backlash during the 2010s, this problem has been mostly solved, and only nine burn pits remain on bases where there is no other alternative to burning trash. The problem now falls on the DoD and VA to serve the thousands of veterans now at risk because they served in areas where using burn pits was the norm. What we should do is use this as an example of what can go wrong. Such a small thing as burning trash has led to disaster for the men and women who were just trying to serve this nation. In my opinion, burning trash should be illegal in all nations and its effects on U.S. service members should be a warning call to nations that still use them. I also hope now with President Joe Biden in office, a man who has said that burn pits in Iraq may have led to his son’s eventual death, he will take global leadership on this issue.

Daly, Matthew. “EPA Acts to Curb Air, Water Pollution in Poor Communities.” AP NEWS, Associated Press, 27 Jan. 2022, https://apnews.com/article/business-environment-and-nature-louisiana-new-orleans-environment-ccb822af6faa062d39f811b437786beb. 

On January 26th, 2022, the Associated Press published an article entitled, EPA acts to curb air, water pollution in poor communities. In 2021, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Reagan took a tour of minority communities in gulf states to better understand the problems plaguing their communities. As a result of these visits, the EPA has announced that they plan to install air filters on chemical plants in the region between Baton Rouge and New Orleans known as the chemical corridor. The EPA also noted that 56% of residents living near toxic sites such as chemical plants, refineries, and landfills are people of color. This has contributed to high rates of diseases like asthma, and also cancer in these communities of color. On the whole, the Environmental Protection Agency promised to be tougher on emitters, strengthen existing regulations, and conduct constant inspections of toxic pollutant emitters in communities of color.

The truth is that certain communities feel the impacts of our climate crisis need to be better understood. After the previous administration rolled back clean air regulations, I am glad to see the EPA under the new administration taking steps to take action on our clean air crisis. In many parts of the nation, factory pollution is what is causing the destruction of their local environments, and the health of the people who live near those areas continues to dwindle. In Silicon Valley, we must recognize our privilege of having mostly clean air, and the majority of our pollution coming from fires and traffic instead of toxins from chemical and manufacturing plants. There are also undeniable links between race, health, and climate change. With people of color already typically having less wealth than white Americans, having had redlining and other housing laws push them to live in potentially deadly areas is a recipe for disaster. In addition, those getting seriously ill and dying from air pollution-related effects tend to be poorer Americans with less access to affordable quality healthcare. We obviously cannot relocate and stop all industrial activities, but my hope is that this administration and society begin to find solutions to the problems that air pollution brings that specifically plague Americans of color.