Quote:
Originally Posted by brando
"...a lot less air pollution back then."
I'm sure that's not correct.
The first half of the twentieth century was all coal-fired - industry, transport, domestic - everything came from the burning of massive amounts of coal. Electricity was generated by coal burning power-stations, and 'house' gas was a by-product of coke production. (no, not that type of coke!  ) Just the daily burning of coal in houses in , say, London created an incredible amount of air pollution. In certain atmospheric conditions London was subjected to heavy 'smog' (literally, smoke and fog) which caused a large number of deaths every year, leading eventually to the Clean Air Act which outlawed the use of coal in London. That came two decades after 1940 however, and the pollution of the time was increased by the need to produce more power, use more trains, and run more factories when war broke out.
The atmosphere over Britain was thick with the carbon particles that coal-burning churns out.
B |
That is very interesting.
What about the overall pollution over rural areas? Would this have been worse back then as well?
I am only asking as I have seen photos of mountain ranges (in the US) from the 1940's and compared them to the same view today.
The view from 70 years ago is much more clear.
07-09-2010, 07:16 PM
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