How did a sudden reduction in shipping pollution inadvertently stoke global warming?

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A major shift in global shipping regulations intended to improve air quality may have temporarily — and inadvertently — set off a geoengineering reaction that is warming the planet, new research has found.

In January 2020, the International Maritime Organization instituted a change in the way goods are transported, substantially reducing the upper limit of harmful sulfur dioxide content in ships' fuel from 3.5% to 0.5%. The move was part of a broad strategy to improve public health, including reductions in strokes, asthma, lung cancer, and cardiovascular and pulmonary diseases for people who live in and around ports.

Larger, long-term concentrations in the air can contribute to the formation of particulate matter pollution, which can penetrate the lungs and lead to significant health problems, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Recent decades have already seen broad efforts to reduce sulfur emissions, including regulations dating back to the 1990s to address acid rain, another of its byproducts.

 

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Cutting pollution from the shipping industry accidentally increased global warming, study suggestsBen Turner is a U.K. based staff writer at Live Science. He covers physics and astronomy, among other topics like tech and climate change. He graduated from University College London with a degree in particle physics before training as a journalist.
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