With the London 2012 Opening Ceremony underway in just a few days, NASA-funded research into the bid to cut traffic emissions around Beijing during the time they hosted the games has recently been released – and the results are impressive.
Map showing the percentage decrease in carbon monoxide emissions for 2007-2008
The main focus was to provide cleaner air quality around the city during the summer of 2008 so that there was a healthier atmosphere for both competitors and public alike; but this research carried out by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) now shows that the constraints on motor vehicles during this time period also ensured that carbon dioxide emissions were drastically reduced by 24,000 to 96,000 metric tons.
Beijing, like other cities in the world, has been intensely industrialized in the past few decades, and with this fact now has unhealthy amount of air pollutants. The restrictions put in place during The Olympics included strict limits on vehicle usage within the city, such as banning 50% of privately owned vehicles, as well as imposing limits on industry and temporarily halting construction.
So what of the relevance of this? The authors of the research commented that this reduction by just one city represents more than 1/4 of 1 percent of the emissions cut that would be needed worldwide (and for a prolonged period) to stop the planet from heating up by approximately 2 degrees Celsius by the end of the 21st Century, i.e. the amount of heating that is thought to have significant societal consequences.
Even though scientists have been aware that a reduction in traffic in an urban area means a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions (and you don’t really need to be a scientist to figure that one out!), these new results are concrete supporting evidence, something which is usually difficult to calculate in reality, according to NCAR scientist and lead author, Helen Worden:
“The Beijing Olympics allowed us to actually measure what happens when people drive much less, and it turns out that it makes quite a substantial difference to our climate. People may think their choice of how to commute to work doesn’t make a difference, whether driving their cars or riding their bikes. But on a large scale, it really does.”
So, all of this research begs the question: should London have followed suit with the Beijing method? Well, not quite, according to Worden. She believes that the same study could not be applied in this case, in part because the cloud conditions and surface in London aren’t as suitable for the carbon monoxide measurements that the research used, and also because London differs from Beijing with regards to its pollution controls. Additionally, London has had restricted traffic controls in the central city for a number of years now, and has added a few of its own measurements for the both the Olympics and subsequent Paralympics – such as specified vehicle lanes etc.
While the research may not be directly relevant to the upcoming games, it does demonstrate how regulating urban traffic flow could be utilised in the future – and is a tried and tested method in the battle to combat climate change.