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The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

bbc.com

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Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#111

Post by jsingleton »

I recently finished reading Clearing the Air: The Beginning and the End of Air Pollution by Tim Smedley, which is excellent and well worth a read if you are interested in this area.

https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/clearing-the-air-9781472953339...

> ...a detailed blueprint for saving our cities. Suggested measures include a ban on all petrol and diesel cars in city centres; the replacement of diesel buses and trains with electric vehicles; and an end to the use of wood-burning stoves and coal fires. It’s an achievable vision, he insists. “However, whether it happens in 10 or 100 years is down to public pressure and political will.”

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/mar/31/clearing-the-a...

I also built a few monitors to add to Sensor.Community (a contributors driven global sensor network that creates Open Environmental Data), which are pretty easy to make.

https://sensor.community/en/

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#112

Post by dfgdghdf »

goodpoint wrote: post #22
stuaxo wrote: post #6

I hope this will lead to changes in roads in London and other places. The closest school to me in London is next to a busy road with twice the legal level of no2, you can see all the buildings along that road are noticeably blacker from exhaust smoke. While electric cars may help a bit, rubber from breaking and tyres is an issue, and cares have been getting much bigger over the last 5 years.

Electric cars still have a significant environmental impact due to the space they take in a city, the production and recycling of the cars, and road maintenance. The efficiency of combined use of trains, electric buses and bicycles dwarfs electric cars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_efficiency_in_transport

Bicycles can even be considered carbon negative if someone combines their daily exercise with their commute.

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#113

Post by sjg007 »

lmilcin wrote: post #93
satysin wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in [redacted], [redacted] and we often have high air pollution warnings and you really can feel it in the air. During lockdown, back in April and May, there was a noticeable difference in the air quality. It felt different. When we went out for a walk you could also tell the difference in noise pollution from there being so few cars on the roads. It was lovely. There is a church nearby that we can sometimes he…

Only minority of cars are responsible for majority of pollution. A single badly maintained diesel car produces as much pollution as thousands of legal new cars. Same goes for trucks -- the low in air pollution you felt was likely not due to less cars but less trucks (and possibly busses, depending on where in Europe you live)

While this is true, diesel alone is terrible. The UK should make diesel more expensive.

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#114

Post by AdrianB1 »

pmiller2 wrote: post #32
pietrovismara wrote: post #25

This pandemic gave me so much to think about air pollution. It puzzles me how we can have, just in Europe, around 800k yearly premature deaths caused by pollution[0] and still not care at all. On the other hand, covid-19 hasn't caused yet as many deaths but we quickly intervened, as it should be. Why can't we, as a society, react with the same effectiveness to air pollution? - [0]: https://academic.oup.com/eurheartj/…

You want the real reason? Fixing air pollution quickly would disrupt the global economy on a long term scale. Capitalism doesn't like that. Edit: Y'all so predictable.

Just curious, who does like disrupting the global economy on a long term scale?

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#115

Post by AdrianB1 »

anarchop wrote: post #106

Diesel particulate pollution is the primary problem. London black cabs are diesel. There is a good case for banning diesel in metro and even suburban areas over time and requiring at least hybrid. Electric busses actually make more sense than cars due to the high regeneration of stopping.

I think that banning Diesel propulsion for cabs is a great idea; first, cabs have high usage and big impact, second they are replaced faster than regular cars so the negative financial impact is minimal, they just buy electric for the next iteration and keep using electric.

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#116

Post by [deleted] »

d_burfoot wrote: post #80

One very simple thing that we can do a much better job at is preventing people from idling their cars in pedestrian areas. I walk through supposedly eco-conscious Berkeley every day, and without fail there is at least one car stopped at the curb, idling, often while the owner plays with his phone. The problem has gotten much worse now that food-order apps are more popular. I think that people have some kind of magica…

[deleted]

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#117

Post by mikecsh »

LatteLazy wrote: post #56

I remember reading about covid death numbers and uncertainty around them. No one dies of HIV, they die of secondary infections. No one dies of obesity, they die of heart failure. Maybe its time we had immediate, short term and general causes of death?

We do. U.K. death certificates have parts 1a - what caused the death, 1b and 1c - contributing factors, and 2 - contributing comorbidities.

For example:

1a Community acquired pneumonia 1b Mesothelioma 1c 2 ischaemic heart disease and type 2 diabetes mellitus

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#118

Post by m0nty »

dfgdghdf wrote: post #95
m0nty wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why can't we, as a society, react with the same effectiveness to air pollution? In the UK at least, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) is a powerful lobby group. Car sales are used as a key economic indicator. Cars have long been seen as aspirational and a measure of personal success. Cars support other sectors of the economy such as civil engineering (roads, bridges), petroleum sales and car acc…

Indeed. What's really crazy is how the "anti" side has managed to claim to be the side of the working class, fighting against a "green liberal elite". This trope is incredibly harmful; the poor don't even own cars in London, yet breathe the most polluted air.

And immediately anyone mentions restricting traffic, they're all about the disabled, older people, ambulances and essential deliveries, when really all they seem to want is to drive their cars as often and far as they like, without restrictions. It really is infuriating.

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#119

Post by satya71 »

pietrovismara wrote: post #25

This pandemic gave me so much to think about air pollution. It puzzles me how we can have, just in Europe, around 800k yearly premature deaths caused by pollution[0] and still not care at all. On the other hand, covid-19 hasn't caused yet as many deaths but we quickly intervened, as it should be. Why can't we, as a society, react with the same effectiveness to air pollution? - [0]: https://academic.oup.com/eurheartj/…

It's much much worse in India. >2M deaths [1] per year, and no one cares. Yet many applauded the stringent lock downs that caused widespread poverty.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/19/india-suffers-...

Re: The first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death

#120

Post by dotancohen »

AdrianB1 wrote: post #99
wongarsu wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU has limits for suspended particulate matter, and at least in Germany all the major cities are battling to stay within the thresholds. A few cities ban diesel vehicles in the city, others put expensive air purifiers next to the measuring stations. People seem to love their cars more than their health, and other measures like modernizing heating don't seem to have much traction.

What I observed in my area is that people are not loving cars more than their health, but they cannot make a difference at a personal level, many don't want to change anything and then people who care stop believing anything can be done and give up. Air pollution is not a fire you can extinguish in 15 minute and move on, it is mass phenomenon with millions of tiny participants, it is the death of the thousand cuts an…

If only we had some form of organization which represented the interest of the People, with the authority to decree and enforce statute.
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