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Black Carbon Pollution a Major Player in Global Warming

New research from UCSD shows black carbon pollution is a major player in global warming. KPBS Environmental Reporter Ed Joyce has more.

Black Carbon Pollution a Major Player in Global Warming

New research from UCSD shows black carbon pollution is a major player in global warming. KPBS Environmental Reporter Ed Joyce has more.

Black carbon is what you see as black smoke coming out of diesel trucks and the black-brownish smoke from wildfires. Other sources include indoor cooking with wood and coal.

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Scripps Institution of Oceanography Researcher V. Ramanathan says soot from the burning and diesel exhaust has 60 percent of the effect of carbon dioxide on global warming.

Ramanathan: The black carbon may have contributed a large amount to the warming we are seeing so far.

He says the black carbon has a warming effect in the atmosphere three to four times greater than current estimates.

Ramanathan's previous research shows that the warming effects of smog in south Asia appear to be accelerating the melt of Himalayan glaciers. He says black carbon may also be contributing to the retreat of Arctic sea ice and melting glaciers.

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Ramanathan: A lot of the tropical glaciers are retreating and we are finding this black carbon is contributing to that.

The work by Ramanathan and a University of Iowa researcher on climate changes due to black carbon is posted on the online version of Nature Geoscience. 

Ed Joyce, KPBS News.