AA Blog1: Seminar

Colette L. Heald: The Climate, Air Quality, and Vegetation Traffic Circle

In Colette L. Heald’s presentation, “The Climate, Air Quality, and Vegetation”, she shares that the climate, air quality and vegetation all interact together to share a unique relationship.

Vegetation emissions decrease the air quality, affecting the environment with potentially temperature fluxes. Ozone was next mentioned as another public health concern, stating how these two issues may result in critical damage of crops and acid rain. Professor Heald then moves on to point out that black carbon is not the second largest warming agent as everyone had previously thought. Her work reveals that brown carbon contributes 35% of the warming of all carbon based aerosols.

Global food security is also affected by these emissions and temperature fluxes because crop productivity is sensitive to ozone and climate change. It’s also been projected that the “rate of undernourishment in developing countries in 2050 nearly doubles due to climate and ozone.”