Guest post by Viv Forbes
There is a persistent green myth that coal-fired power generation causes city smogs. It does not.
City air pollution is nothing new. King Edward I complained about London pollution in 1306, as did Queen Elizabeth I in 1578, long before the first steam engine operated.
Let’s look at the causes of some famous smogs – London/Pittsburgh, Los Angeles/Santiago, the Dust Bowls and the Asian Smogs.
The London smogs were caused by open-air combustion of newspapers, wood and cheap high-sulphur unwashed coal in domestic fires, stoves and boilers; by coal-burning blacksmiths, brewers and ironworkers in smoky forges, furnaces and coke plants; and by many smoky steam locomotives; all with inefficient combustion and no pollution controls. The smog was slowly eliminated by clean air regulations and by changing to “clean coal by pipe” (town gas) and “clean coal by wire” (electricity).
The Los Angeles smogs were caused mainly by backyard incinerators, vehicle exhausts and natural air inversions. They were reduced by using cleaner fuels, better engines and compulsory pollution-control equipment. Santiago has undergone a similar clean-up.
The Dust Bowl conditions of the Great Plains in USA were caused by drought and wind erosion of newly cultivated soils. Gobi Desert storms produced the Yellow River and the Yellow Sea and contribute to the Asian Brown Cloud today.
Today’s Asian smogs have many sources – forest fires in Indonesia; open air cremations in India; dust from volcanic eruptions and desert storms; soot, ash and other pollutants from millions of domestic rubbish fires, mosquito fires, cooking fires and heaters using anything combustible – cow dung, wood, paper, cardboard, plastic or cheap unwashed coal; and soot and unburnt hydro-carbons from millions of vehicles, many with engines needing maintenance and no pollution controls. Beijing today combines the 1950’s problems of both London and Los Angeles.
The Asian smog is NOT caused by producing electricity in modern power stations with closed boilers, pollution controls and using high-quality washed coal such as exported by Australia to Asia. The “power station pollution” pictured so eagerly in ABC and Green propaganda is actually steam from the cooling towers.
The main products released by modern coal-fired power stations are water vapour and carbon dioxide – both are essential life supporters. Neither one is dangerous. Both make our climate more liveable, but the contribution of carbon dioxide to climate is tiny. And the carbon dioxide produced by burning coal has done more to encourage the growth of plants and the greening of planet Earth than Greenpeace will ever do.
“Clean coal by wire” into every home is the one thing that could solve much of the Asian air pollution.
Viv Forbes,
Rosewood Qld Australia
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MattN says:
April 29, 2013 at 7:46 pm
I am having a hard time understanding how all the pollution from burning coal in old London is proof that coal doesn’t cause pollution.
Just because you don’t SEE pollution doesn’t mean there isn’t any there. The trees dead on Mount Mitchell from acid rain say “hello”….
—————————————————————————————————————————
Most of the mature Fraser firs, however, were killed off by the non-native Balsam woolly adelgid in the latter half of the 20th century. The high elevations also expose plant life to high levels of pollution, including acid precipitation in the form of rain, snow, and fog. These acids damage the red spruce trees in part by releasing natural metals from the soil like aluminum, and by leaching important minerals. To what extent this pollution harms the high-altitude ecosystem is debatable.[5]
While the mountain is still mostly lush and green in the summer, many dead Fraser fir trunks can be seen due to these serious problems.
So it actually ISN’T acid rain that is the problem, only conjecture.
MattN said;
“This entry is not up to the usual high standards I am use to seeing on the world’s #1 science blog…”
Matt,
One of the great issues that impedes the free flow of facts is having a too parochial view of life. Whether we are speaking of science, industry (applied science) or even philosophy, any attempt a communication without bridging the gap between your parish and mine will result in an instant stoppage on the information highway.
Viv was trying to give perspective to the problem of air pollution, not offer hard science. Those who were not alive during some particularly bad episode of pollution simply don’t have the perspective to understand the progress. Those who are coming to the situation now see pollution as dire, but are failing in perspective. To give an example, I lived in California in the 1960’s. Air pollution was horrible. Millions were moving into the state and brought or bought cars by the additional millions. In the Central Valley of California, farmers were constantly burning farm waste. Lumber mills were prolific in northern California and each one had a ‘teepee burner’ where waste wood, and quite green, was burned 24/7. The burners and a prevailing breeze from the south produced very visible air pollution, even up into the mountains.
That was then. It is much different now. Is the pollution issue solved in California? Not at all. The population has nearly quadrupled since the 1960’s. But the cars we drive today are virtually zero emission vehicles compared to the land tanks of yore. Farmers are limited in their outdoor burning to very specific atmospheric conditions that must exist before burning is allowed. Winter time pollution here in the Central Valley comes, in large part, from burning wood in fire places and stoves. Because politicians have lost or ignore long term perspective, I can predict with great certainty and no statistics that wood smoke pollution will get worse if we continue down the path to astronomically priced electricity and natural gas. Homes will be warmed in the most economically feasible way, but unintended consequences can and do bite hard.
pbh
Having suffered through the South-East Asia haze of 1997, whose origins and spread were unequivocally traceable to the burning of rainforest in Indonesia (much of which was for palm-oil to be turned into lucrative biodiesel), I can readily subscribe to the view that well-managed fossil fuel energy is much better for the environment than badly managed ‘green’ energy production technologies.
Richardscourtney says:
“…Do you see damaged and/or dead trees and other flora near the power station?
Do you see damaged buildings near the power station?
If you don’t then the “pollution” is not there.
…The issue is not whether the power station emits SOx: it does.
The issue is whether the SOx emission from the power station is sufficient to harm or to overload the natural systems which process SOx.
Emissions are NOT pollution. Excessive emissions ARE pollution.”
Richard is correct that the dose makes the poison. A little bit of pollution can cause little to no harm, a lot of pollution can cause a lot of harm. The issue is figuring out at what point to stop increasing, or stop decreasing pollution. Cost benefit analysis. When the costs of reduction are small and the benefits of reduction are large, keep reducing pollution. When the benefits are small and the costs large, you’ve done enough.
In the early 1970s, the largest emitter of SO2 in North America was the Sudbury, Ontario nickel smelter, which emitted about 10% of all SO2 emitted on the continent. Almost nothing grew in a 10 mile circle around the plant. They’ve cut WAY back now, and have tall stacks now, but if you use Google Earth, you still find that the area around the plant is orange colored, not green (though not for ten miles any more).
As far as I am aware, nothing like that ever happened in the US. The worse acid rain damage was in the Adirondacks, where a type of tree — red spruce? — suffered consistent crown damage, and perhaps (I no longer remember) were so sensitive to the acid rain that some died. Because of its height (in part), Mt. Mitchell also suffered damage of this general nature, but MattN could fill us in on the specifics better than I could.
Acid rain is now very low in the US, as stated before, because our emissions of SO2 have declined by about 80% (and also because the Sudbury smelter’s emissions are much lower now).
So the question is: did we go too far? did we reduce exactly the right amount? In Richardscourtney’s words, “Excessive emissions ARE pollution” — so where are we now on that scale? I would argue we have done our job, but I can guarantee that opinions differ at the Sierra Club.
***
Just an engineer says:
April 30, 2013 at 5:21 am
Most of the mature Fraser firs, however, were killed off by the non-native Balsam woolly adelgid in the latter half of the 20th century. The high elevations also expose plant life to high levels of pollution, including acid precipitation in the form of rain, snow, and fog.
***
Ozone is also a major culprit (like Germany’s Black Forest), due to complex interaction w/mountain-hugging clouds.
MattN’s statement of “it’s acid rain” is simplistic and adolescent. There was no such dieback on the mountains around here (west MD) despite being far closer to the SO2 sources.
to Beng:
Whether acid raid damages trees depends upon a combination of factors.
If the soil has enough alkalinity, the acidity can be neutralized.
If the mountains are high, it receives more acid fog than lower elevations, the high elevations intercept the clouds containing acidity, lower elevations don’t as much.
So the lack of damage in MD doesn’t necessarily mean there was no problem anywhere, back in the day.
***
John says:
April 30, 2013 at 8:29 am
So the lack of damage in MD doesn’t necessarily mean there was no problem anywhere, back in the day.
***
Never said there wasn’t an issue, only that “acid-rain dunnit” was simplistic. The hemlock woolly adelgid has decimated hemlock stands thruout the NE US — nothing to do w/climate & everything to do w/introduced invasive pests.
Back before I was keeping careful track of such quotes, I ran across a snippet from the journal of one of the first explorers to reach the area of Denver in the 1800s and his remark on the pall of smoke, due to the winter layer inversion, and, he thought, the Amerindians’ camp-fires.
Rick Bradford says:
April 30, 2013 at 5:51 am
“Having suffered through the South-East Asia haze of 1997, whose origins and spread were unequivocally traceable to the burning of rainforest in Indonesia (much of which was for palm-oil to be turned into lucrative biodiesel), I can readily subscribe to the view that well-managed fossil fuel energy is much better for the environment than badly managed ‘green’ energy production technologies.”
I lived through that haze as well, and still do when it returns during the clearing season. However, it’s not accurate to blame biodiesel production for that. From a paper on CPO production – “Nonetheless, in aggregate terms still less than 5% of the total CPO production in Indonesia is being used for biodiesel production.”
And that was the biodiesel production as of 2011, source: http://www.cifor.org/ard/documents/background/Day3.pdf
mib8 says:
April 30, 2013 at 9:02 am
Back before I was keeping careful track of such quotes, I ran across a snippet from the journal of one of the first explorers to reach the area of Denver in the 1800s and his remark on the pall of smoke, due to the winter layer inversion, and, he thought, the Amerindians’ camp-fires.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>.
See Francis Parkman’s The Oregan Trail wherein he reports the smoke lingering in the Laramies from forest fires, in 1846.
To Beng:
This is the part of your comment I was addressing: ” There was no such dieback on the mountains around here (west MD) despite being far closer to the SO2 sources.”
There two separate problems. The firs were indeed decimated by the algelid (still are; near Smoky Mountain National Park, local fire departments spray a foam like substance on the remaining live firs which smothers the algelids at a crucial time in their life cycle, or else those firs would also be gone.
Acid rain didn’t cause the algelid problem. But it isn’t simplistic and adolescent to say that acid rain did cause environmental problems, back in the day.
Perhaps this issue is one of wording — maybe Beng means that acid rain hasn’t caused specific probems to firs in the Smokies and nearby Mt. Mitchell, maybe he meant to say that in these specific places acid rain wasn’t the problem for firs.
But acid raid did cause problems, mainly with red spruce dieback, in the Adirondacks and on Mt. Mitchell in N Carolina (the tallest mountain in the US east of Colorado). Does this clear things up?
John:
re your post at April 30, 2013 at 11:02 am
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/29/clean-coal-by-wire/#comment-1292562
You say
I do not know the facts of the specific case which you cite, but – assuming you are right – that does not “clear things up”.
The issue is whether present day emissions are causing harm.
If the present day emissions are causing harm then they are pollution. So, reducing the emissions is desirable.
But
If the present day emissions are not causing harm then they are not pollution. So, reducing the emissions is a waste of money and resources.
And
If past emissions were or were not pollution is not relevant to consideration of whether the present day emissions are pollution.
I draw your attention to my above post at April 30, 2013 at 3:57 am. This link jumps to it
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/29/clean-coal-by-wire/#comment-1292282
Richard
Richard, are we actually disagreeing? Here is what I said in regard to your post:
“Richard is correct that the dose makes the poison. A little bit of pollution can cause little to no harm, a lot of pollution can cause a lot of harm. The issue is figuring out at what point to stop increasing, or stop decreasing pollution. Cost benefit analysis. When the costs of reduction are small and the benefits of reduction are large, keep reducing pollution. When the benefits are small and the costs large, you’ve done enough.”
I have read you post, believe me, I responded to it after reading it.
If we do disagree, maybe it has to do with this part of your last comment:
“If the present day emissions are not causing harm then they are not pollution. So, reducing the emissions is a waste of money and resources.”
I see the amount of pollution control as a balance between the costs of cleanup vs. the damages of the pollution. MAYBE your statement in the paragraph just above implies that if emissions today DO cause harm, then they need to be reduced, regardless of the costs vs. benefits? I you mean pollution must be reduced if it causes ANY harm, regardless of costs, then we do disagree, but I don’t have the sense that you mean that.
John:
re your post at April 30, 2013 at 11:49 am.
Clearly, I misunderstood you and I owe you an apology.
Indeed, I have just put down the phone because my son was so offended at my misunderstanding you that he phoned to give me an ear-bashing about it.
Yes, I now see that we are saying the same thing in different words. I misunderstood and thought you were arguing against my view that harmful emissions are pollution so not all emissions are pollution. I was defending my view, but you were not opposing it.
Sorry.
Richard
Thank you, Richard. It is pretty easy to misunderstand, or get misunderstood, on blogs.
For all those on the trail of the Lonesome Pine in North Carolina:
http://daq.state.nc.us/monitor/data/so2/SO2-99th2009-2011.pdf
The same map for NO2:
http://daq.state.nc.us/monitor/data/no2/NO2-98th2010-2012.pdf
A similar map for ozone:
http://daq.state.nc.us/monitor/data/o3design/o3nc09-11.pdf
To Billy Liar: Nice graphs.
Do you know why so many counties are blank? Is that due to a lack of monitors, or to low pollution levels?
It looks like only Mecklenburg county (where Charlotte, NC is located) is listed on all three maps, and is in violation of the ozone standard (only one other county in NC is in violation, according to the map). Looks like the more rural counties aren’t in non-attainment for ozone. I couldn’t figure out whether there were any localities in non-attainment for the SO2 or NO2 standards from the maps.
It looks like either there aren’t any monitors in Yancey county, on the Tennessee border, where Mt. Mitchell is located, or there are no current pollution violations.
Any further thoughts or comments?
John says:
April 30, 2013 at 1:46 pm
John, I would say that the monitoring is spotty. Looking at the Asheville region there are a number of monitors but certainly not to the level of one in every county.
Mt Mitchell has an O3 monitor active from April to October (currently not active). The nearest county with an SO2 monitor is Swain County (Bryson City) but it’s off line at the moment!
http://xapps.ncdenr.org/aq/ambient/AmbtSite.jsp?loggerList=BY
Here’s the Asheville area map with the monitors marked:
http://daq.state.nc.us/ambient/monitors/Asheville.shtml
***
John says:
April 30, 2013 at 11:02 am
But acid raid did cause problems, mainly with red spruce dieback, in the Adirondacks and on Mt. Mitchell in N Carolina (the tallest mountain in the US east of Colorado). Does this clear things up?
***
Evidence? I’d love to see some credible evidence that acid rain itself (not other pollutants/issues) actually caused damage. Red spruce dieback on stressful high mountain sites was a known & recurring issue before there was acid rain. Most of the plants/trees on my lot thrive from a sulfur additive, even tho the soil is already plenty acidic.
It’s been some time, but the 60 Minutes report that got completely ignored by the MSM & congress cited studies that showed hardly any effect directly from acid rain, except on a few already highly-acidic watersheds flowing into a couple lakes in the Adirondacks.
To Beng:
My conclusions about damages to the roots and crowns of red spruce in the Adirondacks are based on the NAPAP reports — National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program — of around 1990, and later. These reports were multi-Cabinet reports by the US government, with the first report coming out in 1990, continuing reports thereafter.
Reading between the lines, I’m going to guess that you don’t see that report as entirely credible. Since I don’t have reason to trust the federal government’s veracity just because it is the federal government, I can’t defend the report based on all the work that went into it, because the work could have been politicized at some point. All I can say is that what I’ve read about the effect of acid rain on red spruce, roots and crowns, has been consistent for 25 years.
Whether trees and plants where soils are reasonably alkaline thrive with a fertilizer containing sulfur is, I agree, true in many cases. Sulfur is a nutrient at the right doses (just as selenium is for people, at the right doses), but that doesn’t say the same will be true where soils are already pretty acidic, and acid fogs affect the leaves — conditions of the 1970s and 1980s in upstate NY.
Ozone can damage trees, yes, but ozone levels are pretty low in upstate NY, as far as I have been able to find. They tend to be very high within 100 miles downwind of big cities in the summer — that is why Connecticut has such a problem, it’s downwind of NYC.
Yes, I saw the 60 Minutes report as well, way back in the day. They do a good job, generally, but sometimes they have their mind made up before they edit. I wouldn’t necessarily take what 60 minutes had to say, with their shoestring research staff, over the government’s report, with huge staff (but subject to policy changes). But as noted, it is hard to trust the federal government implicitly, either. Are environmentalists the last to still do so?
So I’d like to ask you, collegially: which pollutants (if any) do you think damaged high altitude trees in the Adirondacks, and what is your basis? I might have missed an article or report on another pollutant.
Goldie says:
April 29, 2013 at 3:46 pm
Happy to agree with you Viv – if you need references I can supply a lot from my PhD written in 1993 on Urban Air pollution in London.
—————————
I’m not sure 20 yo science is quite current, eh?
/sarc
Chuck, you then remember the SMOGS of the 1950s? I worked and lived near London. 6,000 people died then and more permanently affected. The pea soupers of the Victorian era were less common then.(They are yellow, and cars had yellow fog lights too) Steam trains I traveled on from Potters Bar to the City (Bank of England, and Cheapside) required me to change my petticoat twice a week because of the 2 inch ring of black dirt on the hem. Diesel trains changed that. They were handing out smog masks at one time, not that I remember buying one, but the smoke free zone cleared the city, swallows returned, city buildings became clean again and so did the dolphins in the Thames. But it didn’t stop the Thames freezing over in 1963? Battersea Power Station, was the largest electricity producer in London then but burnt Coke, not Anthracite, so the Sulphur was removed. One never saw smoke coming from it, when one visited the permanent fair ground at Battersea Gardens opposite the station.