Paradoxically, cleaner air contributes to global warming. Pollution of the Earth's atmosphere with soot and aerosols has decreased by 30% since 2000, but the flywheel of global warming continues to spin, writes Science.

Using an array of satellite observations, the researchers found that the climate impact of global air pollution has dropped by 30% since 2000 levels.. This is good news for public health as fine particles and aerosols in the air kill several million people a year..

However, a more transparent atmosphere is bad news for climate change forecasts.. According to climatologist at the University of Leipzig and lead author of the study, Johannes Kuaas, clearer air has actually increased the warming impact of carbon dioxide, which has risen by at least 15% since 2000.. And as air pollution continues to be contained, the climate scientist says, "

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Burning coal or petroleum products releases greenhouse gases that cause climate change. But emissions of carbon dioxide are also accompanied by emissions of soot and aerosols, which reflect sunlight and cool the planet, partly offsetting warming.. Now emissions of soot and reflective aerosols of sulfates and nitrates are declining, and the rate of warming is accelerating..

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Submitted as a preprint to the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics in April and expected to be published in the next few months, this study grew directly from last year's UN climate assessment..

Reducing air pollution should negate the effect of the fight against climate change. Kuaas and his team found a clear decrease in cloud concentration in regions where the amount of aerosols in the atmosphere decreased..

The conclusion that follows from the results of the study is clear and logical: air pollution kills people - we need clean air. But efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions need to be redoubled.

... It is scary to think what will happen if, in some miraculous way, greenhouse gases disappear from the earth's atmosphere, and the concentration of oxygen increases: the planet will turn into a huge lump of snow and ice. This has happened before in the history of the Earth..

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The cause of the Huron glaciation was an oxygen catastrophe that appeared, during which a large amount of oxygen produced by photosynthetic organisms entered the Earth's atmosphere.. The barely born life on the planet almost killed itself, saturating the atmosphere with oxygen, which became a deadly poison for most living anaerobic organisms that existed at that time and which turned the Earth into a snowball for a long 300 million years..