Pollution Causes Starvation

-gmax: July 22, 2002

A study performed by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, a government research agency in Australia, reports that pollution from industrial nations was one of the causes of the horrific African famine that left 1.2 million people dead.

The starvation brought on by the drought in the 70's and 80's stretched from Senegal to Ethiopia until it finally rained again. "It produced images that haunted people across the world: skeletal mothers staring vacantly, children with bloated bellies lying in the sand, and vultures lurking nearby," Joseph Varrengia of the AP Science Bureau reported.

The analysis made by Australian & Canadian scientists reveals that the drought may have been triggered by tiny aerosol particles of sulfur dioxide from factories and power plants in America, Europe and Asia. In a process known as tele-connection, the particles altered the physics of cloud formation miles away and caused a reduction African rainfall by as much as 50 percent. Scientists are now speculating on how this process may be causing the drought in the United States this year, however that has yet to be modeled in supercomputers the way this most recent intensive study has.

Atmospheric scientist Leon Rotstayn, lead author of the CSIRO study, says that while there were undoubtedly a subtle combination of factors contributing to the drought, the effect of aerosol particles certainly hasn't helped.

Some statistical evidence bears this out. In the 1990s, when the industrialized nations agreed to reduce emissions, rain returned to Senegal to Ethiopia. Most scientists conclude that this is far from coincidence.

According to an Associated Press report on the CSIRO study, the sulfur dioxide pollution particles in this equation, "which can remain in the air 5 to 20 days, probably drifted over the North Atlantic where they created more condensation nuclei for cloud formation. The additional nuclei remained suspended in clouds rather than growing into fewer, larger droplets and falling as rain. In addition, these clouds were brighter than normal, in part because of the added nuclei, and they reflected more of the Sun's energy into space. This cooled the surface of the North Atlantic, which reduced the normal evaporation rate from the ocean and further hampered the moisture cycle. South of the Sahel, the sea surface remained warm and evaporation increased so more rain fell to the south".

Certainty is a big word in science. It requires repeated testing, and verifiable, reproducible results. And in an era where your funding might be cut by an Administration bent on overturning every environmental program under the sun (including solar research), it is no wonder that scientists, out of an abundance of caution, refrain from making sweeping statements about such things. It has been proven that pollution can change temperature and precipitation patterns near its source, but the idea of these effects appearing this remote from the source is new. And the current President-Select is ignoring researched conclusions made and verified over 20 years ago. However, an increasing amount of research is indicating that "one country's pollution can become a problem for other countries as well." One wonders how long Dubya can so blatantly ignore the environment. Maybe if we cut off the AC in the White House, he might stop saying stupid things like, "We should just adapt to the heat". Then again, maybe he'll just fan himself with all his Enron money....

The CSIRO study will be published in the August Journal of Climate.