Dirty brown clouds created by millions of cooking fires in Asia contribute as much to global warming as greenhouse gas emissions and are a major factor in the melting of the Himalayan glaciers, say scientists.
Experts had previously thought the clouds, which hang in a haze over the Indian Ocean, actually acted to deflect sunlight and cool the atmosphere.
The findings have serious implications and will give weight to the voice of those seeking to get India and other developing nations to do more to use renewable energy and find alternatives to wood-burning stoves.
"All we are saying is there is one other thing contributing to atmospheric warming and that is the brown cloud," said Veerabhadran Ramanathan, a senior scientist at the University of California who led the research into the clouds, which was carried out in the spring of last year.
Mr Ramanathan and his colleagues dispatched unmanned measuring devices at different altitudes into the pollution, technically known as atmospheric brown clouds, over the Indian Ocean in March last year, above the Maldives.
Discuss Add this link to... Bury
Experts had previously thought the clouds, which hang in a haze over the Indian Ocean, actually acted to deflect sunlight and cool the atmosphere.
The findings have serious implications and will give weight to the voice of those seeking to get India and other developing nations to do more to use renewable energy and find alternatives to wood-burning stoves.
"All we are saying is there is one other thing contributing to atmospheric warming and that is the brown cloud," said Veerabhadran Ramanathan, a senior scientist at the University of California who led the research into the clouds, which was carried out in the spring of last year.
Mr Ramanathan and his colleagues dispatched unmanned measuring devices at different altitudes into the pollution, technically known as atmospheric brown clouds, over the Indian Ocean in March last year, above the Maldives.
Discuss Add this link to... Bury
LinksMarker is a Web 2.0 content management system
Comments