COVID waste: Archaeologists have a role to play in informing environmental policy
Reading Time: 2 minutesTHE 2020 COVID-19 pandemic is creating a viral archive, an archaeological record of history in the making. One aspect of this archive is increased environmental pollution, not least through discarded face-masks and gloves, collectively known as PPE, that characterise the pandemic. These items of plastic waste have become symbolic of the pandemic and have now entered […]
Covid-19 lockdowns significantly impacting global air quality
Reading Time: 3 minutesLEVELS of two major air pollutants have been drastically reduced since lockdowns began in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, but a secondary pollutant — ground-level ozone — has increased in China, according to new research. Two new studies in AGU’s journal Geophysical Research Letters find nitrogen dioxide pollution over northern China, Western Europe and the U.S. decreased […]
Study: Asian rivers transport more plastic than Europe’s waterways
Reading Time: 2 minutesIN the first study of its kind, researchers from the Netherlands examined the amounts of floating plastic debris at 24 locations on rivers in seven European and Asian countries. Lead author Caroline van Calcar, from Delft University of Technology, said: “Land-based plastics, washed into the ocean by rivers, are believed to be the main source […]
Science diplomacy to address the haze issue
Reading Time: 3 minutesBY TAN SRI OMAR ABDUL RAHMAN, Senior Fellow, Academy of Sciences Malaysia, Chair, Dialog Rakyat Organising Committee THE HAZE conundrum has now joined national unity and social harmony on the list of current issues causing major concern to Malaysians. The former however is demanding more urgent attention than the latter because of itshigh visibility (or […]
Researchers push for better policies around toxic chemicals
Reading Time: 2 minutesFROM high levels of lead found in school drinking water to industry sites releasing toxic heavy metals into the air, over 40 years of regulations in the United States have failed to protect human and environmental health from toxic chemicals. In a new paper published in BioScience, Portland State University researchers contend that these failures […]