New Arctic Council Reports Underline the Growing Concerns About the Health and Climate Impacts of Polar Air Pollution
While black carbon was flagged as a serious problem by the Arctic Council, an all-woman research team tracked it and its sources during a ski across Spitsbergen Island.
By Bob Berwyn
May 20, 2021
The Arctic is now warming three times as fast as the global average, and faces an ongoing barrage of dangerous climate and environmental pollutants, Arctic Council experts warned at the start of their meetings in Reykjavik, Iceland this week. Black carbon, or soot, remains high on the list of concerns because of its negative effect on human health and because it accelerates the Arctic meltdown by darkening snow.
“Reducing black carbon and methane emissions is particularly important,” United States Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said Thursday during the council’s closing session. He added that the U.S. has cut black carbon emissions by 34 percent, the most of any Arctic Council member nation.
Iceland Minister for the Environment and Natural Resources Guðmundur Ingi Guðbrandsson also said black carbon pollution is accelerating the breakdown of the Arctic environment.
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/20052021/new-arctic-council-reports-underline-the-growing-concerns-about-the-health-and-climate-impacts-of-polar-air-pollution/
