Let to find the greatest sources of smoke in the world and then classified them.
We know a part of the smoke and gases in the atmosphere are emitted naturally. Forest fires in different countries are among the natural sources of smoke. There is not any documentary research that what percentage of the smokes in the atmosphere is relative to the natural events annually?
Then we go back to the industrial factories. What percentage of the factories produce more smoke in the world? How many of the factories observe the standards that limit emitting smoke in the atmosphere?
In the third stage, we should pay attention to the cars. Which types of cars produce more smoke than other cars? I'm sure trucks are worse than all. They use diesel fuel that is a hydrocarbon fuel with a high density. Gasoline is a light hydrocarbon with high flammability and produces less smoke but sadly probably the number of gasoline cars is more than trucks with diesel fuel in the world (of course I didn't mention millions of motorcycles that you must add them to the cars)
Then we pay to the jet planes that use kerosene that is a fuel with a high density, as well and they produce a notable amount of smoke in the atmosphere directly.
Ships are another source of the smoke. Thousands of large ships are moving in the seas and oceans day and night. They mostly use diesel fuel that is the worst fuel with a lot of smoke.
An important part of the smoke and harmful gases are produced by people in the houses or nature by burning hydrocarbon, gas, and wood for warmth, cooking, and bathing.
These all are the main sources of harmful smoke and gases that are emitted into the atmosphere that should be classified by some international organization and some documentary information is collected, in the first step. in the second step, some executable and serious decision should be made to reduce the amount of smoke and gases that are produced by the sources. If we ignore the great global problem and wait for the future to resolve it automatically I think we should wait for a black atmosphere of the earth in the future.
Although visible smoke is harmful and contains other contaminants inhospitable to life, it's really just the visible tip of the iceberg, so to speak. On the individual level, we tend to think of driving as our main means of contributing to global emissions, but it's trumped by
air transportation; an entire year of choosing not to drive a car can be offset with a single flight; people don't fly nearly as much as they drive, but each flight has a much larger footprint. However, it's not really fair to lump in consumer transportation with
commercial logistics. Trucks used to transport goods are worse than consumer vehicles, but focusing on these is a bit like sitting on a pile of wigs and splitting hairs.
The main culprits of the greenhouse effect are
Carbon Dioxide and Methane. CO2 is commonly released through the use of fossil fuels or other chemical processes (and can stay in the atmosphere for a much longer time), and methane is off-gassed from landfills, animal waste, or belched by cows (animal agriculture is the main source). It's also part of natural gases that are increasingly used for energy production. Methane leaves the atmosphere within a decade, but can trap up to 100x the heat of CO2, meaning it can have a much greater short-term effect on the environment. Another source of methane is from natural sources underground that are
being released as the permafrost melts: man-made climate change will cause the release of natural greenhouse gases, creating a tipping point where climate change will accelerate and we can no longer reach the brakes. A prime example of a runaway greenhouse effect is the
planet Venus, which is devoid of life as we know it.
One of the sources we might not expect is
concrete, which alone accounts for something like 8% of total CO2 emissions between its production and transportation. There are efforts to offset this by using concrete as a carbon sink
source:
EPA Greenhouse Gas Emissions Data Page
We affect things in other ways as well, like
deforestation. The forests are one of earth's natural tools to capture and sequester atmospheric CO2, not to mention hosting its own ecosystem that gets destroyed when it's clearcut for wood harvesting or to make room for more agriculture (like what's happening in Brazil or the south pacific), replacing beneficial environments with unhealthy/deleterious ones. I have heard that calling the Amazon the "world's lungs" is a bit of an overreach, but it's still a precious resource that should be left alone; the
lack of biodiversity can only make us poorer in the long-run.
The "natural" wildfires you mentioned can also be examples of human activity worsening the situation.
(source:
climatecouncil.org.au)
I've even heard that human activity can be leading to increases in seismic activity, meaning even earthquakes and
volcanic eruptions may be affected (although
human emissions dwarf volcanic activity).
(source:
climate.gov)
Like I said, it's called the anthropocene because humans are now the driving force in shaping the environment. The trends do not bode well for us:
(source:
140-year heat map shows clear trend in global temperature change | Infographic | Climate Council )
It's worth pointing out the various global actors responsible for their contribution to our growing crisis, but it's important not to turn this into a blame game, and frame it more as "we're all in this boat together, and if you burn, we all burn." One thing for sure, is that the people who contribute the least to this problem and who cannot afford to deal with it will be/are already feeling the effects of climate change first.
(source:
140-year heat map shows clear trend in global temperature change | Infographic | Climate Council )
