Innovation Anthology #124: PhD Candidate
A whiff of salty sea air might sooth the soul, but it’s not so great for air quality.
Turns out sunshine and sea salt make air pollution worse around coastal shipping centres. And emissions from marine vessels may be polluting the earth’s atmosphere to a greater extent than previously thought.
That’s the finding of a team of researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
One member of that team is Dr. Hans Osthoff, a new recruit to the Chemistry Department at the University of Calgary.
Dr. Osthoff’s team monitored air quality along the coast of the eastern United States between Charleston, South Carolina and Houston, Texas.
As reported in the journal Nature Geoscience, the scientists recorded unusually high levels of nitryl chloride.
They discovered this compound is produced at night by a reaction between the nitrogen oxide N205, which is found in polluted air, and the chloride from sea salt.
Then in the presence of sunlight, this compound accelerates the production of ground level ozone and other pollutants.
Dr. Osthoff would now like to research whether this chemistry affects air quality in other coastal regions like Vancouver and the Arctic.
FOR INNOVATION ANTHOLOGY,
I’M CHERYL CROUCHER
Guest
Simon Bockstette,
Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada,
Sponsor
Program Date: 2008-04-10