Sequoia
smog damaging pines, redwood seedlings
By
Tracie Cone
Publisher:
Mercury News
5/28/2012
Summary:
Humans
are quickly increasing air pollution every day, creating a thick layer of toxic
chemicals called smog. Even though this
smog is created ever so quickly, it is negatively affecting earth’s biggest and
oldest living thing. These things are the giant Sequoia redwoods, living in the
Sierra Nevada forest. This forest has the worst air pollution of any national
park in the country. As remote as the forest is, scientists are saying that the
ozone levels there are comparable to urban settings such as LA. Smog is so bad
that visitors and job applicants are warned of the unhealthy air quality. What
is damaging the trees are the high levels of ozone. The pine needles are
soaking up the ozone instead of carbon dioxide, which inhibits photosynthesis.
It also stresses young redwood seedlings, challenging them to survive. Not only
does the ozone stress trees, it stresses hikers. Breathing ozone at high levels
for even a short time can blister the lungs like UV rays blister skin.
Warnings
are given to hikers when the air quality is dangerous, which could affect the
parks profit and income. The only way to improve the air in the park is to
improve the San Joaquin air basin, which hopefully will happen very soon.
Opinion:
This
article completely saddened me because I remember in grade school studying the
Sequoia redwoods. Now that I know they are dying because of human actions, it
just makes me so angry. National parks are supposed to be areas in which pure
air is supposed to be present. And the Sierra Nevada forest’s smog may decrease
the amount of visitors, which decreases the amount of income. By this
happening, the forest will not be able to be maintained and could possibly get
even worse.The only way to solve this problem is to improve the air quality and
in order to do that we need to stop the pollution at the source. In this case
the sources are cars and factories. As we learned in class, renewable energies
could be used since not many greenhouse gases result from it. These trees are a
global treasure as the biggest and oldest things on earth. It would be devastating
to see them go extinct because our ignorance and lack of modification to our
energy sources. Therefore, change needs to happen now!
Questions:
1)
Do you think other national parks should be worried about their air qualities?
2) How does the forest being in the mountains worsen the smog (Hint: think thermal inversion)?
2) How does the forest being in the mountains worsen the smog (Hint: think thermal inversion)?
3)
If the redwood forest was to go extinct, how would it affect the rest of the
state of California? The country? The world?
Opinion/reflection:
ReplyDeleteI cannot believe how bad the air quality is in the national park. What is really bad is that even though the area is covered in giant trees the air quality is bad. Which doesn’t really make sense because usually areas with lots of trees have really clean air quality. This shows how bad the world is getting with pollution that some of the cleaner places such as forests are getting polluted badly. For example this forest has the similar ozone levels there, which is a big reason of the pollution. It’s also scary that hikers have to be careful because the air quality is so bad. Hopefully they can improve the air quality like with the San Joaquin air basin.
Answer to question 1.
I think that other national parks should be worried about their parks to but just as a precaution. They should try and prepare because if smog starts building up people can die from the smoke. They should prepare for smog especially if factories or other forms of industry are not far off. If the smog hit many trees would die and we need trees for oxygen and other important things. Also smog ruins business so the parks should try and prepare for that too. So the parks should try and prepare for smog just in case it might come.
Opinion:
ReplyDeleteBy using fossil fuels, we are polluting our earth, causing smog, and from that, hurting our forests. In this case, the Sequoia Redwood tree is suffering in the Sierra Nevada forest. With the ways things are going, it may become extinct. It seems simple: stop polluting, save the tree. However, as always, we have to lay out all our different concerns: economy, people’s well-being, etc. This realization makes the decision merely to stop using fossil fuels less obvious or, perhaps, even right. Still, we should try to limit the pollutants we send into the air. To see the Sequoia Redwood tree go will then cause problems throughout the whole ecosystem and have a continuing downward spiral. The challenge is to find the balance point between legitimate human needs—and economic needs are human needs—and ecological considerations. When I was a kid, I remember seeing pictures of the Sierra Nevada forest and seeing these trees in them. There is a real majesty in those giants. And, surely, thinking how pollution may one day destroy those trees is unsettling. But seeing people impoverished by a collapsed economy caused by substantially rising energy costs is also an unsettling vision. I don’t know what the proper balance point is. That is a judgment beyond me. I just know, however, that the simplistic demand to “just stop polluting” is too short-sighted. Of course the same smog that pollutes the redwood forests is also a human health hazard, so there should be no confusion that I am in favor of “pollution.” Of course I am not. I’m merely noting that the problem is much more complex than bumper-sticker solutions like “Stop pollution now!”
Questions:
1) Have you heard stories of organisms dying off from our air pollution?
2) How far would you go to save the Sequoia Redwood tree?
3) In your opinion, how dangerous is smog?
Opinion:
ReplyDeleteHow smog in a national park can be similar to that of LA blew my mind. The first thing that came to my mind was how similar this situation is to what we were talking about in class about the Donora smog incident, the pressure system trapping the pollutants. While reading this, I was wondering whether or not the national park can end up in the same situation. I know if I were looking to work at this national park, I would not because of the health hazards. Putting cars and factories in the San Joaquin Valley was not the smartest idea, and if I was in charge of planning I would have put factories elsewhere. With California having a large population though, extra space is probably scarce. With all the pollution from cars becoming trapped in the valley, acid rain and other air problems could happen in the valley area. The factories probably provide loads of jobs though, and the people in charge are faced with a tough decision. To get rid of the car pollution problem, I would try alternatives like mass transit.
Answer to Question 2
The forest being in the mountains greatly worsens the problem. As we learned about in class, thermal inversions occur when warm air is above cold air. The effect of a lid occurs, and the pollutants from in the valley trap. With trees like the one in the picture near the top of the lid, they receive more damage than other things below them, like homes. Also, being so high up in general, there is less oxygen. The trees have little air to start with, and the smog harming photosynthesis doesn't help the trees either. This is how the effect is worsened by the forest being in the mountains.
Opinion/Reflection:
ReplyDeleteI was quickly flabbergasted and in confusion on how bad the air pollution was in the Sierra Nevada Forest. For the forest ozone levels to be comparable to urban areas like L.A. really baffled me to see how dirty the air is even in the most unexpected areas. I believed that since there were plenty of trees in forests then the air would be nice to breathe in. Now that I see that it is because of human actions it makes more sense to why the air is dirty. Also I find it very saddening to see one of nature’s beauties, forests, dying because it is an important set to any environment. However seeing as the trees are dying because of ozone levels being high we can see that there is a definite need to lower the amount of fossil fuels we use. In one way or another we could use less electricity, car mileages, industry, etc. to lower fossil fuel use. I think that nature is an important asset to our economy because we get materials for industry from nature but if nature is disturbed then it could also disturb our economy. For trees to die it could negatively affect other organisms that have to do with the trees which could lead a chain down of problems for other organisms. For that to happen it could be very bad but I think that right now with ozone hurting people is even worse. For people to inhale that bad ozone could mean blistering the lungs like it said in the article which is in my opinion possibly life threatening to some unhealthy people. What I see from all this is that we need to make some kind of movement or change towards ozone. People should look more carefully at what they use and how that could be effecting the environment and overall to themselves.
Question 1:
I strongly think other national parks should be worried about the air quality of their parks. If it is possible to have dangerous ozone levels in one national park then it should be possible in another park. What I mean by this is that it would be highly advisable for all parks to check air quality often and see what is wrong with their environment. Looking at the Sequoia trees for example, it showed the trees dying and the seedlings to not grow which overall showed something was wrong with the environment. I think that it is important for us to preserve environments and that is what national parks are for. If even in national parks the trees are dying, how are we supposed to preserve other environments? The answer is that parks should take into more consideration of air quality because it could harm people like hikers in the area.