Two-thirds of the soot particles causing South Asia's Brown Cloud come from biomass combustion such as household cooking and slash-and-burn agriculture, according to new research published in the journal Science.
The study - which was co-authored by UNEP-affiliated scientist Henning Rodhe - is the first to calculate the contribution of biomass combustion versus fossil fuel combustion in the Brown Cloud.
The brownish haze, which comes from various burning and combustion processes, cover large parts of South and East Asia.
The new report finds that 340,000 people in China and India die each year from cardiovascular and respiratory diseases that can be traced to human-induced emissions of combustion particles.
Örjan Gustafsson, a professor of biogeochemistry at Stockholm University and leader of the study, says that the clear message is that efforts to curb the Brown Cloud should not be limited to car traffic and coal-fired power plants. Equally important is fighting poverty and spreading India-appropriate green technology to limit emissions from small-scale biomass burning.
"More households in South Asia need to be given the possibility to cook food and get heating without using open fires of wood and dung," he says.
The article was co-authored by Henning Rodhe, a professor of chemical meteorology at Stockholm University and the vice-chair of UNEP's Atmospheric Brown Cloud programme.
Source: UNEP