Thread by @mclott

Short 🧵…

Last month I spent some time in Delhi and Mumbai as a part of our India Program and India Energy Dialogue series @ColumbiaUEnergy. It was an excellent trip, full of engaging discussions and meetings…

https://twitter.com/columbiauenergy/status/1660718664889278476?s=46&t=GZ5kBg2B-hVEVZ0_5Od7AQ

https://twitter.com/danieljpropp/status/1666218166647660559

In between these meetings, our local colleagues repeatedly and strongly recommended that we wear masks to protect our lungs against the pollution outside. We (and they) were definitely feeling the impacts of the poor air quality on our bodies. 😷 #airpollution

Of course, as someone who studies air pollution from the energy sector and its impact on our health, I started watching the Air Quality Index (AQI) numbers that I could see. Which sat at around 200 in Delhi and 130 in Mumbai during our trip.

To our these numbers in perspective — when I was in India, the AQI in New York City was 50. Not too bad. And better than Austin, where things were sitting at around 75 that day.

Today, NYC is sitting at an AQI of 158. More than Mumbai. Less than Delhi.

The city is covered by wildfire smoke. Masks are coming out.

We are all feeling the difference. And its impact on our bodies. Impacts that we feel today and longer lasting ones.

And I can’t help but think of what we know about the wildfire risks that we are seeing due to our changing climate. In our work @LancetCountdown we track wildfire risk and exposure.

In our annual report in @TheLancet medical journal, the team tracks a whole series of indicators that you can explore for free here —> thelancet.com/journals/lance…

One of the team’s findings in last year’s report was that “human exposure to days with very-high or extremely-high fire danger increased in 61% of countries from 2001–2004 to 2018–2021.”

These data indicate that days like today are already much more common than at the start of the century. And by the analysis and trends, we appear to be poised to see increasing wildfire risk moving forward.

As my colleague John MacWilliams flagged in his testimony in 2020, mitigating wildfire risks is not just about mitigating climate change. Forest management is also a key tool.

Also, wildfires can impact our energy systems in huge ways. Read more here —> energypolicy.columbia.edu/publications/o…

As the climate changes, we see increasing risk of wildfires. And corresponding increasing health risks.

We can do things to mitigate and adapt… improved forest management and bringing down greenhouse gas emissions being two of them…

…and as I said last week in my testimony before @EnergyDems @EnergyGOP, we can protect our energy systems by making sure we design them for the future (and these types of risks) rather than the past.

energypolicy.columbia.edu/publications/t…

Or as I said on Twitter last week…

End 🧵 (for now…)

https://twitter.com/mclott/status/1664372417404321792