Scientists in Germany, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia and Harvard University calculated the most detailed estimates yet of the toll of air pollution, looking at what caused it. The study also projects that if trends don’t change, the yearly death total will double to about 6.6 million a year by 2050.
Advertisement
The findings match with previous less detailed studies on pollution death estimates.
New statistics show that more Indians suffer early death from outdoor pollution caused by traditional cooking and traditional heating than from pollution due to vehicular or industrial emissions.
In the European Union, with a population of around half a billion people, air pollution is responsible for 180,000 deaths annually, highest in Germany at 35,000. According to Jason West from the University of North Carolina, who wasn’t affiliated with the study, these numbers are higher than they were expected to be 10 years ago.
Benchmark Reporter reports that China takes the biggest hit when it comes to air pollution related deaths, with 1.4 million fatalities per year. What’s unusual is that the study says that agriculture caused 16,221 of those deaths, second only to 16,929 deaths blamed on power plants.
“Agricultural emissions are becoming increasingly important but are not regulated”, said Allen Robinson, an engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, who was not a part of the study.
The northeastern US , across all of Europe, Japan, Russian Federation and South Korea, the No. 1 cause of smog and soot deaths is agriculture, according to this new study.
Pollutants including ozone and fine particulate matter – particles so small they’re invisible to the naked eye – contribute to lung disease, heart disease and other serious health problems around the globe, researchers say. “It is an inefficient form of biofuel combustion that causes a lot of smoke and is the foremost source of premature mortality by both indoor and outdoor air pollution in Asia”. However ammonia from fertilizers blended with sulfates and nitrates from the environment gets converted into soot particles, leading to air pollution-linked mortalities.
“We were very surprised, but in the end it makes sense”, Lelieveld said.
Emissions from power plants, factories, vehicles and burning biomass accounted for nearly a third of the deaths, the researchers found.
Reducing air pollution is not only good for public health, it’s good for the climate too.
In the United Kingdom, 15,488 people died due to air pollution, a majority of which could be found in agriculture.
Advertisement
China and India are generally recognized as countries with major air pollution issues.
