air pollution

Beijing’s Air Quality Continues to Show Significant Improvement

Beijing’s Air Quality Continues to Show Significant Improvement

Official figures from the Chinese government show that Beijing’s ongoing seven-year “war on pollution” has netted significantly improved air quality in the capital city, as the South China Morning Post reported. Data released by the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Ecology and Environment showed that concentrations of fine particulate matter known as PM2.5 fell 14.3 percent […]

Join our newsletter

The best of EcoWatch, right in your inbox. Sign up for our email newsletter!

    $5 Billion Plan Could Create Zero Carbon Shipping Industry

    $5 Billion Plan Could Create Zero Carbon Shipping Industry

    A major conglomerate in the global shipping industry wants to start a fuel tax to raise money for zero-carbon ships within a decade, as the AP reported. The International Chamber of Shipping (ICS), which represents 80 percent of the global shipping industry, is proposing to create an NGO called the International Maritime Research and Development […]

    Australia’s Fires Emitted Half of the Country’s Annual CO2 Emissions

    Australia’s Fires Emitted Half of the Country’s Annual CO2 Emissions

    The bushfires that have been tearing through New South Wales and Queensland, decimating koala habitats, taxing the water supply, and choking the air since August have claimed six lives. Now, new NASA data shows that the fires have emitted 250 million tons of carbon dioxide, the equivalent of half thee country’s annual greenhouse gas emissions, […]

    Saving the Ozone Layer 30 Years Ago Slowed Global Warming. Can Similar Cooperation Now Solve the Climate Crisis?

    Saving the Ozone Layer 30 Years Ago Slowed Global Warming. Can Similar Cooperation Now Solve the Climate Crisis?

    The Montreal Protocol, a 1987 international treaty prohibiting the production of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) to save the ozone layer, was the first successful multilateral agreement to successfully slow the rate of global warming, according to new research. Now, experts argue that similar measures may lend hope to the climate crisis. “By mass CFCs are thousands of […]

    Sydney Is Choking on Bushfire Smoke, Poorest Residents Struggling Most

    Sydney Is Choking on Bushfire Smoke, Poorest Residents Struggling Most

    The brushfires raging through New South Wales have shrouded Australia’s largest city in a blanket of smoke that pushed the air quality index 12 times worse than the hazardous threshold, according to the Australia Broadcast Corporation (ABC). Still winds on Tuesday left a stagnant haze over the city so smoky, it set off fire alarms […]

    EPA Watchdog: White House Blocked Part of Truck Pollution Investigation, Caused Lack of Public Information

    EPA Watchdog: White House Blocked Part of Truck Pollution Investigation, Caused Lack of Public Information

    The Trump administration pushed through an exemption to clean air rules, effectively freeing heavy polluting, super-cargo trucks from following clean air rules. It rushed the rule without conducting a federally mandated study on how it would impact public health, especially children, said the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Inspector General Charles J. Sheehan in a report […]