Quote:
Originally Posted by jimjamuser
That IS a question worth answering. I am NOT an environmental engineer. So, hopefully someone else can come up with a better or more complete answer. But, I will spill out what I remember. It has to do with the OZONE layer that protects the earth from TOO MUCH solar radiation. For millions of years lightning caused fires and trees and shrubs would burn (like out west now). This TYPE of burning did NOT adversely affect the OZONE LAYER.
Now the burning of gasoline in a ICE DOES adversely affect the ozone layer. For some reason (?) maybe incomplete combustion the ICE produces carbon MONOXIDE. Whereas, the trees burning produces carbon DIOXIDE, which I believe gets RECYCLED by living trees. The carbon monoxide (CO) drifts upward to the ozone layer and messes it up.
In big cities and with inversion layers the exhaust of the ICE engine, which contains (CO) produces SMOG and makes peoples lungs and eyes ITCH. Inversion layers also trap heat in cities. Population comes into play because the US produced the MOST pollution up until a few years ago when China took over 1st place. And they have terrible SMOG. If the US controlled its population around 250 million people today, the world would be a better place for both the US and the world. Because we would be putting out less pollution and as an additional BENEFIT .....so would China because we are their main BUYER for their polluting industrial OUTPUT. .......... I tried my best to answer that difficult question.
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Years ago there was a Star Trek episode about a world where they solved the problem of overpopulation by having people report for death station at a certain age. Is this where you got the idea of controlling population?