THE HILL - Efforts to clean up air pollution in China and across East Asia may have inadvertently contributed to a spike in global warming, a new study has found.
The decline in aerosol emissions — which can cool the planet by absorbing sunlight — have added about 0.05 degrees Celsius in warming per decade since 2010, according to the study, published on Monday in Communications Earth & Environment.
At that time, China began implementing aggressive air quality policies and was ultimately able to achieve a 75 percent reduction in emissions rate of toxic sulfur dioxide, the authors noted.
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“Reducing air pollution has clear health benefits, but without also cutting CO₂, you’re removing a layer of protection against climate change,” co-author Robert Allen, a climatology professor at the University of California, Riverside, said in statement.