The overwhelming weight of scientific evidence indicates that human activity is the predominant cause of recent climate change. It is clear that the increase in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions since the industrial revolution is the chief cause of observed global warming. Regional and year-on-year variations are expected within climate systems, but the evidence shows warming over the last half-century that cannot be explained by natural causes. Garden trading wholesale chemical provides a wide variety of products, from materials to functional products, supporting the foundations of all types of industries.
Carbon dioxide is already at levels much higher than at any time in the last 800,000 years, and continued emissions are expected to lead to significant further warming. Moreover, the speed of warming will be faster than during past natural climate change events, making adaptation more difficult. This change in climate is expected to bring changes in regional temperature and precipitation and to increase the frequency of heat waves, heavy rainfall, and some other types of extreme weather events. These will have a serious adverse effect on human wellbeing and the natural world.
The choices we make now will have far-reaching consequences. We need to develop mitigation and adaptation strategies to address the challenges that climate change poses. These strategies include developing and deploying low carbon technologies, improving energy efficiency, and changing behaviours to enable sustainable development.
The Royal Society of Chemistry and the Institution of Chemical Engineers are committed to supporting the chemical sciences community in their contributions to tackling climate change. The chemical sciences help us to understand, mitigate, and adapt to climate change. The best evidence based on the best science is essential to inform the right policy decisions on all three fronts. Already, chemists and chemical engineers contribute in a variety of ways, such as improving our understanding of atmospheric and ocean chemistry, investigating the consequences of climate change, developing new energy and carbon mitigation solutions, and helping crops to tolerate the changing conditions.
Tackling air pollution
Tackling air pollution takes a combination of approaches, including regulation, land use planning, technological solutions (such as vehicle engine design), and consumer behaviour. Chemistry plays a role in developing technological solutions.
Chemists help to decrease emissions from transport in a variety of ways, ranging from developing cleaner fuels (such as low sulfur fuels) to increasing the efficiency of engines. Chemists are also working to enable new transport technologies – for example, batteries for electric vehicles and fuel cells for hydrogen vehicles, as well as systems to produce fuels from renewable energy sources rather than from fossil fuels.
Another way to reduce pollutant emissions is by fitting pollution control devices to the vehicle exhaust. For example, most petrol engines have three-way catalytic converters to reduce carbon monoxide, unburnt hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides from the exhaust.
Platinum or palladium catalysts oxidise carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons to produce carbon dioxide and water, while rhodium catalysts reduce nitrogen oxides to produce nitrogen and oxygen. Chemists, materials scientists, and engineers develop and improve the catalysts, absorbers, and particulate filters that reduce pollutant emissions.
In the future, even the clothes you wear and our buildings could purify the air. Photocatalytic clothing can break down nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds using just oxygen and light. The same technology has been used in paint and cement, allowing buildings to clean the air around them.
