Black Carbon: Threat from the Arctic to the Andes

Thank you very much, Warren.

I, [clears throat] I think that it's very ambitious that I walk you through our understanding, but it's more my understanding of, [laughs] of the black carbon.

And, uh, I would like to go through the steps that AMAP went through, uh, in the process of studying and setting black carbon on the agenda.

So, [clears throat] these are the, uh, uh, the historical publications that we have had from the first on top left in, uh, uh, twenty eleven.

That was our first publication on black carbon.

The studies, uh, started, uh, a little bit before.

Mm-hmm.

And we had the, the impact of black carbon on the Arctic climate.

That was mostly albedo reduction.

And, uh, in, uh, twenty fifteen, we have this, uh, big black carbon and ozone as climate forces.

We have the concept of climate forces and short-lived climate forces, and, uh, that's the twenty twenty-one assessment.

The three items on the bottom are about the action on black carbon on... and the impact on the, uh, uh, polar climate.

It's a project that was, uh, sponsored by the EU, and that had three technical issues on, uh, on black carbon, on, uh, what to do with it.

Recently, though, we found that it was very useful for policymakers, because AMAP works at the interface between science and policy, to have a policy brief, something that is more than our summary for policymakers, something that is also answering some of the common questions, and this is the big item that you see on the right.

And it's our policy brief on black carbon that, uh, actually sums up what we know, the state of the knowledge, our, um, [clears throat] input into the IPCC process, uh, from AR5, AR6, and further in AR7, and answers a few of the questions that are classical about, for example, the, the, uh, apparent reduction in, uh, temperature that black carbon could have by going from AR5 to AR6.

So in, [clears throat] going then back to the history, in, uh, twenty twenty-one, we looked at the albedo effect of black carbon, and, [clears throat] we identified black carbon as a driver of, uh, of greenhouse, uh, uh, of melting that is distinct from, uh, from the greenhouse gases, and by darkening the ice, of course.

I mean, I'm preaching to the choir, I suppose, here.

You all know all of this.

And, uh, the... we have the early models of transport to the Arctic and, of course, Antarctic areas, but, uh, we focus on the transport pathways, the long-range transport of climate pollutants.

In twenty twenty-five, [clears throat] we went into the short-term, uh, f-forcing, also the short-term level I called.

So when we have the carbon dioxide as a gas, a climate gas spans several centuries in action, and to black carbon and methane as something that has a shorter timeframe in action.

So we actually introduce this as, uh, something that we can do something about with an much stronger immediate effect.

But of course, we have the co-emission dilemma because black carbon also comes together with sulfur gases, and we could have also a cooling, apparent cooling, depending on the models, depending on how we calculate things.

So it is actually something that has introduced in the public, uh, debate about whether it's good or bad to, uh, take down black carbon.

For example, emissions for shipping, we can, uh, reduce emission from shipping, reduce black carbon, reduce soot.

Thank you very much, Warren.

I, [clears throat] I think that it's very ambitious that I walk you through our understanding, but it's more my understanding of, [laughs] of the black carbon.

And, uh, I would like to go through the steps that AMAP went through, uh, in the process of studying and setting black carbon on the agenda.

So, [clears throat] these are the, uh, uh, the historical publications that we have had from the first on top left in, uh, uh, twenty eleven.

That was our first publication on black carbon.

The studies, uh, started, uh, a little bit before.

Mm-hmm.

And we had the, the impact of black carbon on the Arctic climate.

That was mostly albedo reduction.

And, uh, in, uh, twenty fifteen, we have this, uh, big black carbon and ozone as climate forces.

We have the concept of climate forces and short-lived climate forces, and, uh, that's the twenty twenty-one assessment.

The three items on the bottom are about the action on black carbon on... and the impact on the, uh, uh, polar climate.

It's a project that was, uh, sponsored by the EU, and that had three technical issues on, uh, on black carbon, on, uh, what to do with it.

Recently, though, we found that it was very useful for policymakers, because AMAP works at the interface between science and policy, to have a policy brief, something that is more than our summary for policymakers, something that is also answering some of the common questions, and this is the big item that you see on the right.

And it's our policy brief on black carbon that, uh, actually sums up what we know, the state of the knowledge, our, um, [clears throat] input into the IPCC process, uh, from AR5, AR6, and further in AR7, and answers a few of the questions that are classical about, for example, the, the, uh, apparent reduction in, uh, temperature that black carbon could have by going from AR5 to AR6.

So in, [clears throat] going then back to the history, in, uh, twenty twenty-one, we looked at the albedo effect of black carbon, and, [clears throat] we identified black carbon as a driver of, uh, of greenhouse, uh, uh, of melting that is distinct from, uh, from the greenhouse gases, and by darkening the ice, of course.

I mean, I'm preaching to the choir, I suppose, here.

You all know all of this.

And, uh, the... we have the early models of transport to the Arctic and, of course, Antarctic areas, but, uh, we focus on the transport pathways, the long-range transport of climate pollutants.

In twenty twenty-five, [clears throat] we went into the short-term, uh, f-forcing, also the short-term level I called.

So when we have the carbon dioxide as a gas, a climate gas spans several centuries in action, and to black carbon and methane as something that has a shorter timeframe in action.

So we actually introduce this as, uh, something that we can do something about with an much stronger immediate effect.

But of course, we have the co-emission dilemma because black carbon also comes together with sulfur gases, and we could have also a cooling, apparent cooling, depending on the models, depending on how we calculate things.

So it is actually something that has introduced in the public, uh, debate about whether it's good or bad to, uh, take down black carbon.

For example, emissions for shipping, we can, uh, reduce emission from shipping, reduce black carbon, reduce soot.