Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
years less than people to the south due to respiratory diseases. The cumulative effect
over 30 years meant there were 2.5 billion years of lowered life expectancy in the
affected area, a tragic testimony to the damaging effects of coal burning that added
so many particles in the air, creating mortality rates which were 55 % on average
higher than in the south.
These negative health effects must be added to the problems that the build-up of
carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is having on atmospheric change—with
coal, especially the soft bituminous types—having greater problems than the oth-
ers in this regard, given its output of particulate matter as well as many greenhouse
gases when it is burned for energy. In addition about a third of the greenhouse gases
build-up comes from natural sources, from animals, forest fires, land use changes,
or the methane released from the melting of permafrost areas, which do provide
significant additional sources, although they are outside the remit of this chapter. In
addition, fossil fuel use ought to be reduced because they are finite, although there
is a great deal of dispute about the extent of the reserves of each fossil fuel resource.
Many of these disadvantages have been ignored until the last 20 years, or just
coped with, through local policies to eradicate or reduce specific problems in specif-
ic areas. Although each city varies in the extent of these problems, depending on the
mix of fossil fuels used, Fig.
5.6
(OICA
2012
) shows that on a world scale the biggest
Fig. 5.6
Carbon dioxide emissions and human activities: Proportions. (Source: Revised from
information in OICA, Paris,
2012
)
