“Bogotá is becoming less smoggy. Thanks largely to improved infrastructure, the Colombian city’s air pollution fell 24 percent between 2018 and 2024,” notes The Doomslayer. Bogotá is Colombia’s capital city and has at least 9 million people.
The Guardian reports:
At the turn of the century, Bogotá was one of Latin America’s most polluted cities, with concentrations of harmful particulates at seven times the World Health Organization’s limits. In the last decade the city of 8 million has started to turn that around, cutting air pollution by 24% between 2018 and 2024.
Part of the shift has been the city’s embrace of the bicycle and other forms of clean transport. There are now 350 miles of cycle lanes snaking across the city, the largest cycle lane network in Latin America. Bogotá has also quietly rolled out 1,400 electric buses, one of the world’s largest sustainable bus fleets, and there are three new cable car lines (two under construction) to take people to and from the mountains.
Transport accounts for more than a sixth of polluting PM2.5 particulates in Bogotá, with trucks accounting for about half of that. Bogotá has started a pilot program to replace the most polluting trucks with new trucks, although trucks’ engines are not the sole cause of the pollution. Some pollution occurs because of unpaved makeshift roads in poor areas, roads that emit dust when used by trucks. “About 40% of PM2.5 emissions come from dust churned up by traffic on these unpaved roads,” an expert says.
“Global emissions of local air pollutants have probably passed their peak,” reports Our World in Data. Sulfur dioxide emissions are down sharply since the 1980s. So are carbon monoxide emissions.
Some places, however, still have lots of air pollution. Pollution is so bad in India’s capital that it is planning to use artificial rain to combat air pollution.
Pollution is very bad in much of northern India. If you travel through it, you get dust all over your car’s windshield, dust between your teeth, and dust covering your clothes. India’s capital, Delhi, is a dusty megacity. Its 35 million people die years sooner than they otherwise would, due to air pollution.
Scientists have engineered wheat that needs less fertilizer, which could lead to less pollution and world hunger.
Researchers have found that water hyacinth can get rid of microplastics and heavy metal pollution.
