FALL 2007 HONORS COURSES

HONR 238O Environmental Issues of the 21st Century: Air Pollution in Africa
Monday/Wednesday 2-3:15 p.m.
Dr. Jeffrey W. Stehr and Dr. Lackson Marufu, Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science

Until recently the potential for the generation of air pollution generation in third world countries—predicted solely on the basis of indicators of industrialization—has been underestimated. It is now recognized that while mainstream industry may not be a major source of pollution in developing countries, other less conspicuous sources are important. The most significant of these is biomass burning; and, in regions with rapidly growing economies such as Asia, vehicular emissions are becoming increasingly serious too. Developing countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America are estimated to account for up to 90% of global biomass burning activity. Products of biomass combustion include carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), methane (CH4), non-methane hydrocarbons (NMHC), nitric oxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) (NO + NO2 = NOx), and particulate matter (PM). The gaseous and particulate species released by these processes do impact health and the environment. CO2, CH4, and O3 are greenhouse gases that impact global climate while CO, CH4, NMHC, and NO are chemically active gases that lead to the production of pollutant ozone in the troposphere. Carbonaceous particles affect the radiation budget of the Earth and hence, global climate by scattering and absorbing solar radiation.

Furthermore, these emissions can be lofted into the free troposphere by convective mixing near source, and once up they may travel long distances on the stronger winds aloft later to be mixed back to the surface by subsidence or convective episodes, thereby impacting areas thousands of miles from source. Third world countries cover large portions of the global surface and support most of the global population. Much of the growth in emissions in the coming decades will come not from North America or Europe but from the developing world.

This course starts with a general overview of the state of the human environment in Africa vis-à-vis deforestation, desertification, drought, air pollution, water pollution, and soil erosion. For each of these issues a brief account is given of the; current state of affairs, causes, possible mitigation approaches, constraints, as well as best and waste case scenarios for the future. The course then narrows to address Air Pollution in Africa in greater detail covering: pollution types, pollution sources, chemical transformation of emissions in the air masses, primary and secondary emissions, transport of emissions in space, fate of emissions (sinks), and estimation of the contribution of African emission sources to global budgets and the overall global climate change phenomenon.

Evaluation will be based on participation in discussions of lecture and reading material, and grades from a research paper and presentation on a third world environmental issue of interest.

There is no textbook for this course; reading material will be compiled and provided by the lecturer.

CORE: Physical Sciences non-lab [PS]