Topic drift alert!
So, jbee, interesting remark there. You remark that the favourable climatic inversion layer in the Tucson Orange Belt began to show pollution issues around the 1970s.
That's interesting in that one might have expected pollution to begin to decline around then. I opine from the basis of experience of a very different climate but my example is the UK: In the 60's we brought in the clean air act which effectively banned domestic coal burning, converted power stations to gas and cleaned up the atmosphere (we used to get thick, sulphurous smog frequently back then which is unheard of nowadays). Having cleaned up the air we began to clean up buildings which were black in those days and remain clean, (ish) pale Portland or Sand stone (or whatever) today. Also in the 70s and 80s vehicle emissions began to be cleaned up with catalytic converters and better engines. So if inversion layers exist in the uk they would have got progressively cleaner air. Why not so in Tucson? My guess is that Tucson never burned that much highly polluting fuel (coal and fuel oil), doesn't have so much heavy industry, the sun banishes a lot of pollutants (whereas it hangs around in the damp air in the uk, under cloud mostly) and its a region of relatively low density population. So air was relatively clean and pure to start with. Furthering my guesswork, I suspect the main source of pollution would be increased motor vehicles particularly those using diesel fuel from that period to the present. If traffic is increasing a lot, the relative effect of cleaner emissions per vehicle would be somewhat offset. If pollution remains or is worse today that would add veracity to my theory.
Am I right? What is the reason for the Orange Belt increase in pollution and why is it a problem? Unless pollution is REALLY bad as in Tokyo or Beijing you don't really notice it that much on a day to day basis.
I suspect I may be displaying Barroom Lawyer syndrome here as I'm just hypothesising. You're going to tell me now, Jbee, that the pollution is due to a huge factory importing coconut shells and firing them to make artists charcoal, or that you get power from burning waste in recycling power stations which are all in the Orange Belt. Maybe a huge volcanic vent in the Tortolitas* opened up around then vomiting forth from hadean fumaroles, brimstone and black lava with choking gaseous emissions and the searing heat of upwelling ash-laden carbonic magmas roiling and spewing from the very bowels of hell itself**.
Give me some chapter and verse on this one, Jbee, oh sage!
John
* Or maybe Scottsdale?
** I only wrote that clause for the fun of writing the purple prose!
“The History of Pollution in Tucson, Arizona”
By Johnny B. Goode
In the late 1960’s, I arrived in Tucson. My parents built their retirement dream home on a pile of rock and cactus in the southern end of the foothills of the Catalina Mountains. From this perch, each evening they would sit on their porch, or gaze out the picture window at the city lights glistening and crisp below, as Tucson, population 240,000, stretched out. It was in the same period when the hit song, “The Lights of Tucson” could be heard on the radio. In the daytime, EVERY DAY, we could see a few small bumps on the horizon 70 miles to the south, peaks residing in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico. The air was so clean that there was a surreal quality to the view. The lack of humidity gave pollutant particles nothing substantial to grasp onto, unlike the haze that we had left up in Michigan, with its lakes, grey days, and lush vegetation.
As the 1970’s progressed, each year there were more days that we couldn’t see those tiny bumps to the south. Slowly, a majority of days were as such, until one year the increments produced the situation where we began to count the days that we could actually see those peaks. The Santa Rita’s on the south end of our valley began to look hazy, just silouettes instaed of displaying a s detailed view. A layer of yellow smog was seen from other spots, but not from our vantage point, which was in the inversion layer of smog. I watched this progression as my parents stayed with that house for over 40 years.
There is a layer of smog to be seen. It is thick and ugly each morning, engulfing downtown Tucson, as seen driving down the Interstate I-10 most mornings and reminiscent of LA or Phoenix. Each day, as things warm, it dissipates quite a bit. In the evening, those lights of Tucson look more like the glow of a thousand campfires and their smoke. For the light pollution that hurts dark skies and the local observatories (Tucson is called optics valley) we now have amber lights, but his isn’t a golden jewel because of the haze.
There have been 100F plus days when warnings occur telling people to keep their children indoors because of the ozone.
What happened:
Population is now well over 1 million in the valley, plus the noticeable winter visitor swelling of traffic crescendos at Christmas Time. Each road has a dusty dirt soft shoulder. There are dirt roads. The farm fields decrease visibly during the furrow and planting seasons (three crops each year, lettuce, cotton, mostly). The stats tell us that 42% of the visible air pollution is from diesel exhaust. We have had pollution controls on our cars, from California’s early example, since the middle 1970’s.
It must be added that we get notable pollution at times from Mongolian dust storms. When I formerly stood atop places like Kit Peak Observatory, I could see to California and Mexico in dramatic fashion. Now, a haze can be seen all the way, in any direction. We get crap from all over, and as far away as the other side of the planet. It is a global thing. I have seen the greenhouse gasses cover the entire southwest, not just Tucson, in my lifetime.
The air has gone from natural surreal to this. My baseline is perfectly clean air. I am grateful that there is a hill between me and the city, so I don’t have to look at it as a foggy cloud covering my spectacular memories.
Mix-mash of anecdote:
We have mostly pollution free industries.
Occasionally there may be a forest fire and the sky turns dark and you can smell it, even as far away as New Mexico.
It is dry and we naturally have more dust. If you have ever hitchhiked in a dry place, you have noticed how there are little dust devils all along a road when a car passes.
In the old days we could see the pollution coming from the copper smelters and mines. These days most of that is history.
It ain’t near as bad as Phoenix, which is a Sh-t hole, seven to ten degrees hotter than here, with the associated asphalt and car exhaust heat, population over 4 million.
When the monsoon rains come and the snowbirds fly, or drive home, it is pretty here. Clouds make for fantastic sunsets, traffic is more reasonable, evenings are very comfortable and the lightning is noted as some of the more incredible in the world, things get green again, like an extra spring. Every few years, those mountains can be seen down south and the detail can be seen everywhere.
Coconuts?!! There ain’t no coconuts for a thousand miles. We just dispose of the shell into the trash after making one of our gourmet raw food concoctions. What do people do with those shells, anyway?
Jbee
