GEOG 122 Lecture Notes - Lecture 23: Urban Heat Island, Mountain Pine Beetle, Smog
Document Summary
Lecture 23: from air pollution to global warming. Themes: interdependence of human systems (industrialisation, urbanisation, energy use) and physical systems (air pollution, greenhouse efect) climate change. An example of human geography"s environment- society tradition: scale efects: with globalization, outcomes that were localized and minor become international, even global, and serious in their consequences. Chernobyl: a local industrial accident in a nuclear reactor in ukraine in 1986 became a global polluter as radio-active clouds circles the world twice. Historic air pollution in london: london"s fog is so thick one might have spread it on bread , london"s fogs converted the human larynx into an ill-swept chimney . London"s 4 day pea souper smog of 1952: 12000 fatalities: this was resolved with two developments. The second was a change in the heating of homes. Because of the coal they used to warm their houses. Beijing smog, 2013: 7 million die globally each year from air pollution.
