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62–588 2010

CLEARING THE SMOKE: UNDERSTANDING THE 

IMPACTS OF BLACK CARBON POLLUTION 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SELECT COMMITTEE ON 

ENERGY INDEPENDENCE 

AND GLOBAL WARMING 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

MARCH 16, 2010 

Serial No. 111–15 

( 

Printed for the use of the Select Committee on 

Energy Independence and Global Warming 

globalwarming.house.gov 

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(II) 

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ENERGY INDEPENDENCE 

AND GLOBAL WARMING 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts, Chairman 

EARL BLUMENAUER, Oregon 

JAY INSLEE, Washington 

JOHN B. LARSON, Connecticut 

HILDA L. SOLIS, California 

STEPHANIE HERSETH SANDLIN, 

South Dakota 

EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri 

JOHN J. HALL, New York 

JERRY MCNERNEY, California 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin, Ranking Member 

JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona 

GREG WALDEN, Oregon 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan 

JOHN SULLIVAN, Oklahoma 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

PROFESSIONAL STAFF

MICHAEL GOO, Staff Director 

ALIYA BRODSKY, Chief Clerk 

BART FORSYTH, Minority Staff Director 

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C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hon. Edward J. Markey, a Representative in Congress from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, opening statement .................................................... 1 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 3 

Hon. F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Wisconsin, opening statement .............................................................. 5 

Hon. Jackie Speier, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, 

prepared statement .............................................................................................. 6 

WITNESSES

Dr. Tami Bond, Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental 

Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign .............................. 8 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 11 

Dr. Veerabhadran Ramanathan, Professor of Climate and Atmospheric 

Sciences, Scripps Institution of Oceanography .................................................. 21 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 23 

Dr. Drew T. Shindell, Senior Scientist, NASA Goddard Institute for Space 

Studies .................................................................................................................. 36 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 38 

Mr. Conrad Schneider, Advocacy Director, Clean Air Task Force ...................... 46 

Prepared Statement and Additional Materials .............................................. 49 

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(1) 

CLEARING THE SMOKE: UNDERSTANDING 

THE IMPACTS OF BLACK CARBON POLLUTION 

TUESDAY, MARCH 16, 2010 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ENERGY INDEPENDENCE

AND GLOBAL WARMING, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:10 a.m., in room 

1310, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Edward J. Markey 

(chairman of the committee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Markey, Inslee, Cleaver, and Sensenbrenner. 

The CHAIRMAN. Good morning. 

On December 5th, 1952, soot-filled smoke from London’s factories 

and fireplaces settled on the city, and over the next few days thousands of people died from the soot and fumes. For years, the iconic 

image of Los Angeles was not the Hollywood sign; it was an obscured skyline. And while much progress has been made to clean 

up this pollution, clouds of sooty smoke continue to blanket homes 

from Mexico City to Mumbai, harming the health of millions of people. 

Soot is the visible portion of carbon pollution from smokestacks 

and tailpipes, burning fields and forests. It sticks to our lungs. It 

causes asthma and heart disease. It is what gives smoke its ominous color. 

And, as the saying goes, where there is smoke, there is fire. In 

this case, the fire is increased global warming. The black carbon in 

soot is one of the most potent warming agents affecting our planet. 

From diesel trucks to inefficient factories, from the cookstoves in 

southeast Asia to the burning forests of the Amazon, black carbon 

and other components of soot rise into the atmosphere every time 

we burn fossil fuel or biomass. There, black carbon absorbs sunlight and traps heat. Stuck on water drops and ice crystals, black 

carbon reduces the cooling effect of clouds. And when black carbon 

eventually falls out of the air and settles onto ice sheets and mountain snow pack, it accelerates the melting of ice and snow, contributing to rising sea levels and threatening water supplies. 

Cutting emissions of black carbon could yield rapid benefits for 

our health and climate. Black carbon only stays in the atmosphere 

for a few days to weeks before settling out. That means that a global effort to reduce these emissions would act fast to prevent resWReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARING

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piratory disease and aid in the fight against global warming pollution. 

And we already have the technologies needed to achieve deep reductions, including particle filters, improved diesel engines and efficient cookstoves. Developing and installing these technologies 

would create jobs and move us forward in the clean energy economy. 

Now, I am sure there are some who would argue that if we cut 

black carbon pollution, we can delay on reducing greenhouse gasses 

like carbon dioxide. This simply will not address the momentous 

challenge that we face. For homebuyers, a solid downpayment can 

keep the mortgage more manageable, but they still have to make 

the monthly payments. If we want to keep the planet a viable residence, a downpayment in the form of black carbon reductions won’t 

replace the need to make sustained investments in clean energy. 

Each year of delay will make it more difficult to keep temperatures 

from rising, and it will continue to put the American economy at 

a competitive disadvantage. 

We recently took steps to cut black carbon and greenhouse gas 

pollution. Last year, the House passed the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act, which will set us on a pollution-cutting path and at the same time create millions of new jobs, 

making America the global leader of the clean energy economy. 

Working with Representative Inslee, we incorporated a number 

of provisions that would cut emissions of black carbon here at home 

and seek opportunities to curb emissions abroad. This will provide 

innumerable benefits for our health and for our climate. 

The deadly soot-filled London fog of 1952 encouraged the U.K. to 

enact their own clean air laws in 1956. My hope today is that, even 

in the fog of war that sometimes envelops our progress on clean energy and climate change, that we can still clear the smoke to find 

common ground on issues like black carbon. 

I look forward to the testimony of our witnesses and hearing 

from them how Congress can help address this important issue. 

I would now like to recognize the ranking member of the select 

committee, the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr. Sensenbrenner. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Markey follows:] 

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Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

There is so much controversy about how to confront climate 

change that sometimes there seems to be no common ground. However, by taking a realistic approach to black carbon, we can have 

a positive effect on the environment without breaking the bank, 

which is something that both Democrats and Republicans should 

support. 

Black carbon, which is essentially soot, doesn’t get the attention 

that CO2 receives. That is too bad because the more focus on black 

carbon would produce immediate results for the environment without requiring the types of regulations that stifle the economy. 

Scientists are learning that black carbon is one of the leading 

contributors to climate change. Most global emissions of black carbon come from energy-related combustion and the burning of biomass. By coating both the air and the planet’s surface with soot, 

black carbon absorbs heat at a dangerous rate. But unlike CO2, 

which hangs in the atmosphere for decades, black carbon lingers 

for only days at a time. 

It is also easier for society to address the emissions of black carbon. There are already a number of ways to reduce these emissions 

without relying on the cost-prohibitive technologies that CO2 regulations would require. 

Most of the world’s black carbon is produced in Asia. Surprisingly, when it comes to black carbon, the U.S. isn’t cast as the bad 

guy, as North America produces less than Europe, South America, 

and Africa. But much of the black carbon produced in the developing world could be offset with simple technology and techniques. 

Improved farming and forestry policies would go a long way toward reducing the soot. So would cleaner-burning stoves, which are 

already readily available and could be cheaply deployed in many of 

the developing nations where dirty, inefficient stoves are commonly 

used. It would be a lot cheaper to buy clean stoves for developing 

nations than to implement draconian CO2 regulations. 

As Congress struggles over how to confront climate change, black 

carbon reductions, targeted investments in research and development, and improved transmission are cost-effective options that 

could have large impacts without crippling our economy. 

I want to welcome Dr. Drew Shindell of NASA Goddard Institute 

for Space Studies, who will talk about the immediate impact that 

could result from cleaning up black carbon emissions. 

Hybrid truck legislation that I have introduced would also help 

black carbon. Diesel engines are a primary source of black carbon. 

Since most trucks use diesel, reducing fuel use in trucks would reduce both CO2 and black carbon emissions. My bill would create a 

grant program in the Department of Energy to fund research and 

development of hybrid truck technology. 

This is one approach that is simple and affordable. There are 

many others, and I hope today’s hearing leads to more understanding of this problem and its solutions. 

Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. I thank the gentleman very much. All time for 

opening statements of Members has been completed. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Speier follows:] 

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The CHAIRMAN. We will turn to our first witness, who is Dr. 

Tami Bond. She is a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign. Dr. Bond’s research considers the interactions between 

energy use, the composition of the atmosphere, and the global 

science system. 

We welcome you. Whenever you are ready, please begin. 

STATEMENTS OF TAMI C. BOND, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, ARTHUR AND VIRGINIA NAUMAN FACULTY SCHOLAR, DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN; 

VEERABHADRAN RAMANATHAN, VICTOR ALDERSON PROFESSOR OF APPLIED OCEAN SCIENCES, DISTINGUISHED 

PROFESSOR OF CLIMATE AND ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES, 

SCRIPPS INSTITUTION OF OCEANOGRAPHY, UNIVERSITY OF 

CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO; DREW T. SHINDELL, SENIOR SCIENTIST, NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION, NASA GODDARD INSTITUTE FOR SPACE STUDIES; 

CONRAD SCHNEIDER, ADVOCACY DIRECTOR, CLEAN AIR 

TASK FORCE 

STATEMENT OF TAMI C. BOND 

Ms. BOND. Thank you, Chairman Markey and Ranking Member 

Sensenbrenner and members of the committee. Thank you for this 

opportunity to discuss black carbon and its role in climate change. 

I am really honored to be here and to participate in the committee’s important discussions as you explore a wide variety of solutions to clean energy and climate change. 

I have been working on black carbon for about 15 years. I do everything from models of emissions in the atmosphere to measurements of diesel engines and cookstoves. So, although I sit in front 

of a computer most of the time, I have definitely gotten my hands 

dirty. 

Black carbon is the dark component of smoke. I am going to start 

by giving you an idea of what a powerful climate impact it has, 

putting some numbers on what Mr. Markey said. 

One ounce of black carbon in the atmosphere absorbs about the 

amount of sunlight that would fall on a tennis court. This light 

turns into heat and warms the atmosphere. One pound of black 

carbon absorbs about 650 times as much energy during its short 

lifetime as one pound of emitted CO2 does during 100 years. 

An old diesel truck, not our current regulations, but an old diesel 

truck driving for 20 miles would emit about a third of an ounce of 

black carbon. That is about the weight of two nickels. That would 

heat the atmosphere during its short lifetime as much as adding 

a home furnace to it. Now, after a week, that heating is gone because the particles fall out of the atmosphere. If they fall on snow, 

they can warm it and melt it. 

Over that same 20 miles, the same truck will emit about 70 

pounds of CO2. And that would add five times the warming of the 

black carbon but spread over 100 years. So there are two mayor effects: one short, one long. 

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Estimates of black carbon ‘‘forcing’’ or the atmospheric warming 

today are between 20 percent and 60 percent of carbon dioxide’s. 

We have high confidence that atmosphere and snow forcing by 

black carbon and its interaction with sunlight leads to warming 

and is significant in comparison with greenhouse gasses. One of the 

uncertainties, however, is how those same emissions change clouds. 

I would like to add an analogy to that of Mr. Markey. Reducing 

black carbon emissions is a short-term solution to climate change. 

It is a bit like applying an emergency brake to a car that is out 

of control. You slow the vehicle quickly, get a little time to think, 

but your vehicle will still run away if you don’t take your foot off 

the gas pedal, if CO2 emissions are maintained. 

The estimated emission rate of black carbon is about 8.3 million 

tons per year. Total emissions from the United States are about 

460,000 tons. That is about 5.5 percent of the global total. Of this 

total—that is, the global total—diesel engines provide about a 

quarter. Solid fuels like wood and coal burned for home cooking 

and heating are also about a quarter. Small industries are about 

10 percent. And open forest and grassland burning is the remaining 40 percent. 

There are uncertainties in global emissions. The totals are probably underestimated, especially in developing countries. However, 

we are confident that the sources I mentioned are very large contributors to global black carbon. 

It is important to note that there are international initiatives 

working on both diesel engines and cookstoves. This doesn’t mean 

that they have all the resources they need. 

I have given you a very simple picture. However, sources that 

emit black carbon also emit several other pollutants: Cooling particles that reflect light away from the Earth and gases that warm 

the Earth by changing ozone and methane. You can think of each 

source like a bathroom faucet. The mixed water can be very warm 

if you turn on the black carbon or the gasses, very cold if you turn 

on the cooling particles, and the net result depends on the balance. 

So sources with high emissions of warming pollutants are the 

most promising targets for reducing warming. Of the sources I listed above, diesel engines are the richest in warming pollutants by 

far, followed by residential cooking and heating, industrial sources, 

and, last, open burning of biomass. 

Since the late 1800s, emissions in the United States have gradually transitioned from residential wood and coal to industry to diesel engines. This development track is common through much of 

the world. In countries at low levels of development, black carbon 

emissions come mainly from solid fuels for heating and cooking. In 

developed regions like the United States and Europe, the main 

sources are diesel engines. 

There are three big drivers of cleaning up black carbon. First, 

technology. Our very first success was in the use of pulverized coal 

boilers to increase coal use and yet reduce black carbon emissions 

at the same time. Second, clean fuels. Introduction of natural gas, 

electricity, and liquified petroleum gas has played a large role in 

cleaning up residential emissions. That is just one example. And, 

finally, regulation and government participation in technology development, such as the initiative that Mr. Sensenbrenner menWReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARING

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tioned. These have driven advanced technologies and retrofit programs for diesel, for example. 

Now, to confirm that reducing sources rich in black carbon will 

benefit—— 

The CHAIRMAN. If you could just summarize, please. 

Ms. BOND. I am on my last paragraph. 

To confirm that reducing sources rich in black carbon will benefit 

climate, we have to estimate the net effect of cleaning up individual emission sources, our best estimate of cloud response to particle emissions, which is very important. I and three other scientists are leading a group of about 30 coauthors in a study to assess those questions, and we expect to have a product in June. 

I don’t think that all the questions about black carbon will be 

solved by June, but that report should be able to tell us which actions can be taken soon and what targeted research is needed to 

evaluate actions in the near future. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Ms. Bond follows:] 

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The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Dr. Bond, very much. 

Our second witness is Dr. V. Ramanathan. He is a distinguished 

professor of atmospheric sciences at the Scripps Institution of 

Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, and the 

director of the Center for Atmospheric Sciences. He is the chair of 

the National Academy of Sciences panel that provides strategic advice to the U.S. Climate Change Science Program. 

We welcome you, sir. Whenever you are ready, please begin. 

STATEMENT OF VEERABHADRAN RAMANATHAN 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. Chairman Markey, Ranking Member Sensenbrenner, and other honorable members of the committee, I am 

truly honored by this. 

My own work is using autonomous—— 

The CHAIRMAN. Is your microphone on down there? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. I think so. Can you hear me now? 

The CHAIRMAN. Yes. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. Can I start over or get 20 seconds? 

The CHAIRMAN. All right. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. My own work is using autonomous, unmanned 

aerial vehicles to measure this absorption of sunlight by black carbon directly. 

We also use instrumented aircraft like the Gulf aircraft, and we 

have followed black carbon transport all the way from China across 

the Pacific Ocean into the U.S. So these things travel long distances. 

We also have stations in the Himalayas and in the Sierras to see 

how the black carbon settling on the snow darkens the snows and 

causes melting. And we have measurements for all of these phenomena. 

And the first thing we have to recognize—first of all, I completely 

agree with the opening statement by both the chairman and the 

ranking member. The BC impact, impacts the air pollution and 

health at regional scales—and I will talk about that—and global 

scales, in terms of global warming. 

At the regional scale, black carbon influences cloud formation 

and heats the air around it, disrupts rainfall patterns, such as a 

monsoon in India. And the deposition of black carbon on bright 

snow surfaces darkens ice and snow. And this, along with the 

warming of the air by BC, contributes to the warming of the Arctic—my colleague, Dr. Shindell, will talk about that—as well as the 

elevated regions of the Himalayan-Tibetan glaciers and snow 

packs. Thus, black carbon is directly linked with the water budget 

of the planet. 

Relating to the global warming effort of BC, current estimates 

show the contribution of BC, black carbon, to the heat addition of 

the planet is as much as 20 percent to 60 percent of that due to 

carbon dioxide. The 60 percent value is my estimate with Professor 

Carmichael, in which we constrained the global network of instruments and aircraft data. 

As has been mentioned, BC is an important fast-action tool in 

mitigating long-term warming due to greenhouse gases. To give an 

example, reducing black carbon emissions by 50 percent today will 

lead to a 50 percent reduction in the heat trapped by them within 

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a few months so that policymakers will witness the success of their 

actions during their tenure. I think it would also be a great opportunity to test climate scientist theories and models. And it is instructive to compare the potential of BC as a mitigation tool with 

that of CO2 reduction. 

The manmade carbon dioxide blanket weighs a staggering 880 

billion tons. The weight of black carbon in the blanket is a minuscule 250,000 tons, except it almost has half the effect of CO2. However, we have to point out, CO2 reductions are required to avert 

large warming. For example, we are currently adding about 35 

gigatons every year, and it is growing at a rate of 2 to 3 percent. 

At this rate, we will be adding another 1,500 billion tons of CO2

during this century. So black carbon reduction should be thought 

of as complementary and not as supplementing CO2. As has been pointed out, two important targets for reductions of 

black carbon are those generated by diesel and BC generated by 

cooking with biomass fuels. For example, I am working with a village in India, trying to understand replacing the cookstoves, the 

traditional cookstoves, with nearly smoke-free cookstoves, how 

much climate warming we would avoid. 

So the last thing I want to conclude, the science of black-carbonclimate link we have to understand is relatively new, compared to 

what we have spent—over 4 or 5 decades—understanding the issue 

of CO2. And, as a result, every month we are finding out yet another way in which black carbon impacts the environment. So this 

is the science in the making. 

I just want to give you three major examples. The interaction of 

black carbon within clouds and the impact on precipitation and 

cloud extent—this might emerge as one of the bigger issues. The 

role the black carbon atmospheric heating and ice/snow darkening, 

its role on the observed warming and melting of the alpine glaciers 

and snow packs. It is an emerging science. Lastly, impact of black 

carbon on the Arctic warming and sea ice retreat, which I think 

will be covered by my colleague, Dr. Shindell. 

Thank you so much. 

[The statement of Mr. Ramanathan follows:] 

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The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Doctor, very much. 

Our next witness is Dr. Drew Shindell, a senior scientist at 

NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. He is also a lecturer 

in the earth and environment sciences at Columbia University. Of 

his many distinctions, he received a National Science Foundation 

Antarctic Service Medal and a Scientific American Top 50 Scientists award. 

We welcome you, sir. Whenever you are ready, please begin. 

STATEMENT OF DREW T. SHINDELL 

Mr. SHINDELL. I would like to first thank the committee for the 

opportunity to testify this morning. 

Direct observations of climate seldom reveal cause and effect, so 

that the influence of black carbon on surface temperature must be 

estimated using models as well as data. Several independent methods find broadly similar results, with an overall global mean warming due to black carbon that is about 15 to 55 percent of the warming due to carbon dioxide, as we have heard. Black carbon has likely had even larger regional effects, especially in areas such as the 

Arctic, due to its strong impact on snow and ice. 

Black carbon affects other aspects of climate in addition to surface temperature. Several studies have indicated that the large 

amounts of smoke and haze observed near Asia can cause shifts in 

a monsoon. 

The physical mechanism linking black carbon to changes in precipitation is clear and operates worldwide. Unlike temperature 

changes, shifts in precipitation nearly always have negative net 

economic impacts, as long-term infrastructure has quite sensibly 

been designed for norms over past decades. 

Actual policies will usually impact emissions of many compounds 

simultaneously, since incomplete combustion produces substantial 

amounts of other particulates and gases in addition to black carbon. Hence, it is necessary to examine the net impacts of all emissions from a particular activity on climate. Furthermore, emissions 

of pollutants also affect the quality of the air we breathe. Policies 

typically treat the air quality and climate effects separately, however. 

Encouragingly, research has shown that the optimal strategies to 

reduce black carbon and the ozone precursors carbon monoxide, 

volatile organic compounds, and methane are similar whether the 

goal is improving air quality or limiting global warming. This argues for a stronger emphasis on reduction in emissions of these pollutants in air quality policies, for which there would be a climate 

co-benefit, and in climate policies, for which there would be an air 

quality co-benefit. 

Research suggests that strategies to simultaneously improve air 

quality and mitigate global warming differ from region to region. 

In the U.S., reductions in overall emissions from diesel vehicles appear to achieve both goals, with the substantial part of the benefits 

coming from reduced black carbon. More generally, increases in 

fuel efficiency coupled with reductions in emissions from both 

gasoline- and diesel-fueled vehicles show the most positive results 

for climate and air quality. 

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In contrast, many countries in the developing world use fuel with 

high sulfur content, as the U.S. did years ago. Hence, in developing 

Asia, where particulate emissions are larger than in any part of the 

world, reductions in emissions from both industrial processes and 

residential cooking stoves offer ways to simultaneously improve air 

quality and mitigate warming. 

The health benefits that would be gained from reductions in particulate and ozone concentrations are clear from epidemiological 

studies. While these benefits are most strongly felt in nearby population, long-range transport of air pollution can also be substantial. 

And, hence, the health impacts of air pollution are not simply a 

local issue. Climate impacts extend even more broadly. 

Particulates also impair visibility, with detrimental impacts on 

tourism and recreation. Elevated levels of ozone cause damage to 

plants, leading to economic losses from reduced agricultural and 

forestry yields and decreased food security. Many projects to control black carbon, carbon monoxide, volatile organics, and methane 

emissions may therefore have higher benefits than costs, even 

without including any value from reducing warming. For example, 

both State and Federal diesel emissions regulations have shown 

human health benefits five times or more than the cost of implementing the regulations. Air pollution leads to $70 billion to $270 billion in damages per 

year in the United States alone. So there is clearly a great deal of 

potential for co-benefits, including health care cost savings. 

Though further research is clearly needed to reduce uncertainties, we can already conclude that reductions in emissions of black 

carbon are likely to be a useful component of strategies to mitigate 

climate change. Realistic emissions reductions would affect several 

types of particles and gasses and, thus, require a careful analysis 

of their net impact. 

In summary, while there is more to learn, several things are already clear: Reductions in emissions of products of incomplete combustion will virtually always improve health. And by targeting 

emissions rich in black carbon, carbon monoxide, volatile organic 

compounds, and methane, many options are available that will simultaneously mitigate climate change. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Mr. Shindell follows:] 

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The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Doctor. 

And our final witness is Conrad Schneider. He is the advocacy 

director of the Clear Air Task Force, a nonprofit environmental research, education, and legal advocacy organization. 

We welcome you, sir. 

STATEMENT OF CONRAD SCHNEIDER 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member 

Sensenbrenner, and members of the committee. My name is 

Conrad Schneider, advocacy director of the Clear Air Task Force. 

And I want to thank you personally for the leadership that you and 

this committee have shown on the issue of climate change and for 

the work done in passing the Waxman-Markey bill. I appreciate 

the opportunity to speak with you today regarding policy options 

for reducing black carbon emissions. 

The Waxman-Markey bill made an excellent start in dealing with 

this issue, and we appreciate you revisiting it today because it represents a promising approach that deserves immediate attention, 

both in the climate bill and in other legislation currently before 

Congress. 

At the outset of today’s hearing, I just want to make one thing 

very clear: Addressing black carbon and the other short-lived climate forcing agents, such as methane and ozone, is not a substitute for enacting comprehensive climate change legislation to 

deal with carbon dioxide emissions. We are going to need both and 

then some in order to address the climate crisis. 

I want to try to give a sense of urgency to this hearing, as well, 

and these solutions. Imagine a world in which the Arctic is literally 

melting; that the Arctic Ocean is about to become ice-free, we are 

told; that permafrost is melting, potential releasing millennial 

stores of carbon dioxide and methane. And we are searching, globally, we are searching for strategies that can counteract this situation almost immediately. And we find a strategy that not only can 

act immediately to do so, but it could save hundreds of thousands 

of lives globally. 

We don’t have to imagine very much. That is the situation we 

face today. And reducing black carbon is a strategy that can deliver 

those immediate benefits. In fact, some experts estimate that black 

carbon emissions to reduce global warming could deliver as much 

as one to two of the Socolow wedges that you all are familiar 

with—the goals of trying to use a variety of different steps to meet 

the Carbon Mitigation Initiative’s 200-billion-ton goal. 

And, as you have heard, black carbon is not only a climate forcing agent, it is a potent, deadly air pollutant. In the U.S., we have 

estimated that diesel particulate emissions alone will cause over 

21,000 premature deaths this year. 

So black carbon is a win-win for climate and public health, but 

given the tremendous environmental and health benefits of reducing it, relatively little is being done in the U.S. or globally to actually attack this problem. The previous panelists identified diesel 

engines, cookstoves, and agriculture burning as the most controllable sources of black carbon. So I am going to focus there today 

on the policies that we can use to attack them. 

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Now, last year, due in part to the leadership of Representative 

Inslee, Congress directed the U.S. EPA to study the issue of black 

carbon and report back early next year, about a year from now. It 

is supposed to inventory the sources, assess the potential metrics, 

and identify the most cost-effective approaches for reductions. 

Now, on one level, the solutions for these source categories are 

pretty simple. For diesel engines, there are filters available to trap 

up to 90 percent of this pollution. For cookstoves, the key is replacing existing smoking cookstoves with more efficient cookstoves. And 

for agriculture burning, it involves shifting the burning away from 

the spring season and using pyrolysis to turn waste into biochar 

that sequesters carbon and increases agricultural productivity. 

However, all of this is easier said than done. There are over 11 

million diesel engines in use today without filters, tens of millions 

globally. Half the people on Earth use inefficient cookstoves, and 

unnecessary agriculture burning persists in many places. 

For diesels, the debated policies boil down to two things, and the 

kind of things that you don’t want to hear, necessarily: mandates 

and money. The U.S. and the EU have adopted new engine standards that are going to reduce these emissions by 90 percent, but 

it will take decades before they are fully effective. In the meantime, 

we really need to focus on retrofitting the existing diesel fleet with 

these filters. 

Now, the Waxman-Markey bill directed EPA to exercise its existing authority over black carbon. And the lion’s share, as you have 

heard, in the United States comes from diesels. But, unfortunately, 

the EPA, under the Clean Air Act, has the authority to regulate 

only 1 million out of those 11 million diesel engines. An analysis 

by MJ Bradley Associates estimated that targeting just that million 

could achieve the climate benefits of removing 21 million cars from 

the road and would save approximately 7,500 lives, yet EPA has 

failed to act. 

On the money side, the Kerry-Boxer bill that passed the Senate 

committee devoted a portion of that bill’s allowance allocation proceeds to fund the Diesel Emission Reduction Act, DERA. DERA 

passed in 2005 and authorized a billion dollars over 5 years to 

clean up diesel. However, it has been chronically underfunded. The 

Recovery Act provided $300 million for DERA, but EPA received $2 

billion worth of applications for that money and is sitting on $1.7 

billion worth of project applications that could cut black carbon 

emissions significantly today. Additional funding for DERA should 

be included in any jobs bill that passes this year. And since DERA 

expires next year, it should be reauthorized and fully funded. 

In addition, the upcoming transportation bill reauthorization offers the opportunity to reduce black carbon from diesel construction 

equipment. We believe that work on federally funded transportation infrastructure projects should be accomplished with clean 

diesel equipment paid for through the transportation bill funds. 

And Associated General Contractors, the people who own that 

equipment, they agree. Last year, we negotiated a set of joint clean 

construction principles with AGC. Now Representative Hall of this 

committee, with the support of several Members here, is championing the effort to see that those principles are included in the 

transportation bill. 

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For cookstoves, the Waxman-Markey bill calls for providing assistance in foreign countries to reduce black carbon emissions and 

specifically outlines actions to provide affordable stoves for developing countries. It notably also provides a set of performance 

standards, which are excellent. 

However, the bill did not allocate any allowances or auction proceeds to fund the program. The U.S. should lead in the creation of 

jointly funded international programs to develop regionally appropriate strategies to deploy these stoves. But they face many other 

challenges, as well, including cultural acceptance of the stoves, the 

need for on-site verification and mitigation, and cheaper stoves that 

can be deployed at scale. 

And, lastly, stemming agricultural fires in the spring when Arctic ice and snow is most affected by the deposition of black carbon 

requires overcoming cultural resistance to long-held agriculture 

practices. Black carbon emissions from spring agricultural burning 

in the northern latitudes are highest in Eurasia and in North 

America, in the grain belt. Black carbon emissions can transport 

directly from there into the Arctic, darkening the surfaces there 

and accelerating melting. So these fires present a clear target for 

mitigation. 

So, in conclusion, policies targeting black carbon emissions offer 

a viable climate strategy that can be implemented without delay, 

that will deliver immediate climate benefits, using technology that 

is available today. And, moreover, they can deliver important public health protections from one of the most potent and widespread 

air-pollution-related public health threats. 

Winning these policies will not be easy, but their significant benefits make them extremely cost beneficial, and they may constitute 

our best hedge against near-term climate impacts. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Mr. Schneider follows:] 

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The CHAIRMAN. I recognize the gentleman from Washington 

State, Mr. Inslee. 

Mr. INSLEE. Thank you. 

This is really an excellent panel. Dr. Bond, if I had had someone 

like you in college, I would have fulfilled my fantasies of becoming 

a physicist. So, thanks for your educational work here. 

First question: Is black carbon a proxy for the health benefits of 

reduction of other emissions associated with fossil fuels? If we reduce black carbon, do we get the benefits, almost by necessity, of 

reductions of other emissions? Or are they different? 

Ms. BOND. There is a lot of similarity, and there are some differences. 

Black carbon is just a component of particulate matter, which 

has severe health impacts. And so you can reduce particulate matter and also reduce black carbon, or you can reduce particulate 

matter and if you don’t target black carbon sources, then don’t get 

the black carbon reductions. 

Now, your question was the other way around. If you reduce 

black carbon, do you always get the health benefits? In fact, the 

health benefits are more clear for black carbon reductions than the 

climate benefits. The climate benefits have some uncertainty. 

There are sources for which we are confident in the climate benefit. 

But the health benefits are always existing. 

Mr. INSLEE. So let me ask a little different question. If we made 

an investment in our diesel transportation fleet of X dollars right 

now and our interest was on the health impacts, would the best investment to be, at least in the short term, the filtration systems 

to capture black carbon and then get health benefits associated 

with that, or would there be a better investment for better health 

impacts? 

Mr. Schneider. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. I will try to take that one. 

The Clean Air Task Force has analyzed the benefits of looking 

at power plant pollution cleanup, diesel pollution cleanup, car pollution cleanup from both a health perspective and from a climate 

perspective. And if you factor in, if you take into a combination 

both the health and the climate benefits, there is no better investment than in a particle filtration system. 

Particulates are the most deadly air pollutant. Black carbon may 

deliver the fastest climate benefits. So, taken together—and when 

you have a technology that can deliver a 90 percent reduction in 

the particulate/black carbon, you have a real winner for a technology. 

Mr. INSLEE. I introduced this black carbon bill, I don’t know, 

about a year, year and a half ago, and it seemed to me the right 

thing to do. But since then I have seen a documentary showing 

that the soot on the surface, it was either the Arctic or Greenland, 

and I can’t recall which it was, but it showed these depressions. 

The whole sheet of ice I saw had these depressions. And at the bottom of the depression, there would be this patch of black soot, and 

I mean black soot, against the white ice. And it looked like the entire cap was covered with this stuff, at least at the bottom of each 

one of these little melt pools. It caught my attention. 

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And I guess the question is, is the albedo effect of black carbon, 

how does that compare to the general climate change when it is in 

the atmosphere? Is it just a small part of the problem or a big part 

of the problem? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. Maybe I can answer part of that question. 

If you look at global warming effect of black carbon, this albedo 

effect contributes about 10 percent of the total black carbon effect. 

But if you look in the Arctic or in Alpine glaciers, then the darkening effect may be the dominant effect. Because black carbon 

warming comes from trapping sunlight in the air. But, locally, in 

the sea ice and the glaciers and the ice sheets, the darkening effect 

may very well be the dominant effect. 

Dr. Shindell. 

Mr. SHINDELL. Thank you. 

We believe that anywhere where there is snow and ice, the effect 

you have been describing occurs. In places like the Himalayas, the 

results are somewhat more ambiguous because you have a fair 

amount of wind-blown dust and other types of pollutants that are 

already deposited on those glaciers. So it almost certainly contributes, but how much it contributes there is more ambiguous. 

In the Arctic, which tends to be very far from, say, dust sources, 

the snow is very clean, so the effect is extremely large. And there 

we believe that it is quite possible that black carbon is responsible 

for over half of the accelerated melting we have seen in the last 

few decades, or at least over, say, the 20th century. 

Mr. INSLEE. Do you mean the albedo effect from the black carbon? 

Mr. SHINDELL. Well, it is both the effect of black carbon in the 

atmosphere and the albedo effect. And the effect on albedo is obviously very local, but even the effect in the atmosphere has an extra 

powerful impact on the Arctic because most of the sources are from 

the Northern Hemisphere industrialized or developing nations, 

which means that their emissions are closer. 

So, unlike CO2, which just drifts around uniformly everywhere, 

the black carbon being physically emitted in the Northern Hemisphere, fairly close to the Arctic, allows it to have an even stronger 

impact on the Arctic than it does on the global average. 

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Schneider, you pointed out what sounded like a 

potential imperfection of the Waxman-Markey bill, which we don’t 

believe there could ever be an imperfection on that work of art. But 

you did make reference to, I thought that the provision that would 

implement a regulation on black carbon would apply only to 1 million of the 11 million units. Could you explain that? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. I will. And thank you very much. And let me 

just offer another opportunity to thank and commend the committee and the people who worked so hard on that bill. And I appreciate you all revisiting the issue today, hopefully to maybe 

strengthen the black carbon provisions, which are already the best 

in any bill. 

Mr. INSLEE. And, by the way, if there is an imperfection, it is not 

those two gentlemen’s responsibility. I will take full responsibility. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. I suspect that when—— 

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The Chairman. I actually praised Congressman Inslee in my 

opening statement for the provisions. So I think he deserves full 

credit for everything that is—— 

Mr. INSLEE. Including the imperfections. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. The bill basically directs EPA to exercise its existing authority over all sources of black carbon, the largest, nearly 

60 percent of that in the U.S. being diesel. So it is sort of directing 

EPA to deal with diesel. 

And the imperfection, if there is one, is not in the Waxman-Markey bill. It is in the Clean Air Act, which gives EPA only the authority, in terms of in-use diesels, to deal with a very small slice 

of those engines. The only provision in the Clean Air Act that allows that is one called—it is a rebuild provision. Whenever any 

truck engines are rebuilt—that is, taken from an old, rebuilt to be 

in a new—EPA has the authority to issue more stringent emissions 

standards for those rebuilt engines. 

And in this country, over the next decade, we project that only 

about 1 million vehicles will rebuild in that way. So if EPA exercised, as you directed them, to use the full extent of their authority, 

they could only cover that 1 million set of rebuilding engines over 

that period of time, whereas the in-use fleet is 11 million. That 

would include all the other trucks that don’t get rebuilt and would 

include all the off-road engines: The construction equipment and 

other engines. EPA right now has no authority over those, and the 

courts have said so. I mean, it is very clear that that is constrained. 

So one of the first things we would say that needs to be fixed in 

that regard is to give EPA broader regulatory authority to require 

filters and after-treatment devices on the existing fleet. And we 

promote the idea of doing that in conjunction with incentives to 

turn over the fleet faster and potentially economic incentives, like 

in the Diesel Emission Reduction Act, to pay for some of that. 

But one of the things that is holdings us back right now is we 

have this golden opportunity to deal with these sources, which are 

public health threats and climate forcers, but EPA really can’t go 

much further. 

I don’t mean to be overly critical, but I would point out also that, 

even with respect to the engine rebuild rule, EPA is aware that 

that authority exists and is studying the question, looking at the 

question of whether to exercise that authority. And we hope they 

will shortly, but to date they have not. 

Mr. INSLEE. What is the best assessment of the costs associated 

with that that has been done already? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. In terms of the rebuild rule itself? 

Mr. INSLEE. Yes. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. I believe that to deal with those million engines, 

depending on what—not every engine can take the most advanced 

type of filter, so that you have a mixture of solutions. It is several 

billion dollars, with a ‘‘B,’’ to comply with that. 

Mr. INSLEE. All right. 

So, next question: To what extent is black carbon an issue on our 

coal-fired utility plants? We have talked about diesel. Is black carbon an issue at all with coal-fired utility plants? 

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Ms. BOND. Not to the best of our knowledge. The combustion in 

a coal plant is good enough that it burns out all the black carbon. 

And that has changed in the last hundred years, but that has been 

one of our successes. So there may be particulate matter, but most 

of it isn’t black. 

Mr. INSLEE. And I just was reading a little blurb today about a 

U.N. program to improve residential stoves, essentially, in the subSaharan African area, to try to get the more efficient stoves. Is this 

a viable strategy? On an international basis, what would it take to 

really have a meaningful system to improve the efficiency of these? 

Open question. 

Ms. BOND. I will say something. I am sure Dr. Ramanathan will 

want to speak, as well. 

Two answers, as any good scientist would give you, or any good 

economist. First, yes, it is, because people want new technologies, 

people want clean cooking. And of course there are some cultural 

barriers, but it is definitely a potential solution. 

The second answer is that you have to be careful how you do it. 

We have learned quite a lot about how to improve residential combustion. That includes both what to do and what not to do. What 

not to do is to parachute in, drop a bunch of improved stoves, and 

hope that people accept them. 

But there is a lot of history in that field. And, as mentioned, you 

need to work with the communities, follow up, and, above all, think 

big-scale. And that involves both technological and implementation 

innovation. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. I will just follow that for India and South 

Asia. In India alone, 150 million households use mud stoves, using 

firewood. There has been a long history of trying to replace this, 

and, by and large, they have failed. 

And we got into this just since last year. We have taken a small 

village, and the first thing we found was that technologies were not 

ready. I mean, they were sort of built in a laboratory and really 

didn’t adapt to village conditions. And just in the last year or two, 

there are several companies, Shell and British Petroleum have 

come with improved stoves. There are also some U.S.-based companies. And they, we find now—we have tried five of them. And I am 

not allowed to give the names yet because we will publish the data. 

At least one of them seems to do the job. The women are happy 

with it. I am happy with it because it cuts down the black carbon 

emissions. So it is a convergence of the scientific interest of reducing and cooking with something which is adaptable to local taste. 

So I think the technology is almost there. 

The last thing I want to mention is that India has now started 

on a major cookstove program nationwide. And it is not clear which 

way that program is going. 

Mr. INSLEE. You mean not clear whether it is going clean or unclean? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. No, I mean to cleaner cookstoves, India’s program towards cleaner cookstoves. 

Mr. INSLEE. Got it. 

I am going to ask one more. This question is a little farther afield 

of this hearing, but I will ask Dr. Bond. 

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I have experienced a lot of frustration at the lack of understanding in a lot of places, including the U.S. Congress, about 

science associated with climate change, ocean acidification, black 

carbon, and the like. And one of the sources of frustration is that 

the information the scientific community has does not get shared 

with Members of the U.S. Congress. They just don’t have an appreciation, for one reason or another, because they haven’t heard from 

scientists enough, frankly. 

I am surprised that—you know, we have people walking around 

here today, the U.S. Capitol, who are aggrieved, and they are petitioning their government for redress of grievances in a certain sort 

of direction. But I haven’t seen scientists up here demanding action 

from the U.S. Congress, except in the most restrained, polite, academic, almost silent ways. 

If I was a scientist and I knew what, frankly, a lot of scientists 

know in this country is going on out there in the planet, in the climatic systems, and in the oceans, I would be in somebody’s grill 

about that, telling them that we need action. And yet you just don’t 

see that from the scientific community, with very few exceptions. 

We got a letter from, I think, 250 scientists last week I read, saying, ‘‘Wake up and smell the roses. This problem is still there, even 

though there were some nasty e-mails out of England.’’ But that is 

about it—a letter, not a person laying down on the tracks. 

Why doesn’t that happen? Should it happen? And how do we engage the scientific community to be more sharing of the information they have when it needs to be shared? 

I am focusing on you, Dr. Bond, because you are an educator and 

you are responsible for the future crop of scientists that we are 

going to depend upon. 

Ms. BOND. Thank you, Mr. Inslee. 

I think it was just Monday when I told my air quality modeling 

class that some of them should run for office. So I hope that helps. 

Mr. INSLEE. That would be great, just not against me. 

Ms. BOND. You are well-established enough. I think I voted for 

you when I was at University of Washington. 

Mr. INSLEE. Well, I appreciate that. 

Ms. BOND. At any rate, this is a difficult question, and it has to 

do with the nature of scientists and how they approach science. 

If you have an action outcome, one is almost afraid that you will 

affect the science, because you are supposed to look at it dispassionately. And so, how we conduct our business, 99.9 percent of 

the time we must step back from what we want the outcome to be. 

We are not allowed to want an outcome. 

And perhaps that leads to a disconnect between us and the people like you and like the rest of the committee who are able to put 

that science into action so wonderfully, to think of so many measures, as Mr. Schneider outlined, to implement action in society. 

Ms. BOND. I don’t have a good answer for you. I can’t advise the 

scientific community to become more passionate because they want 

to be very careful, and that is a very important component of the 

scientific method. But I can say that if you perhaps had discussions 

like this one, or even more informal discussions in which there was 

mixing between the committee, like yourself, and a group of scientists, that that communication might flow a little more easily. 

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Mr. INSLEE. Well, I will just take this one opportunity to encourage the scientific community to figure out a way to be dispassionate objectively, but passionate about sharing the information they do have with the people who can give effect to those policies. And I think that is possible in the human intellect to do both 

of those things. 

And if we don’t have the scientific community doing that right 

now, we are not going to solve this problem because people, frankly, won’t know about it. And this is great to have our committee 

doing this, but if we don’t have scientists getting people and shaking them by the collars to get them to understand how significant 

this problem is, people are sleepwalking over a cliff. And frankly, 

the scientific community are the people vested with the intellect 

and knowledge who have the ability to get people to wake up. So 

I am just pleading with you, as members of the scientific community, to try to engage your members and colleagues in an effort to 

educate the U.S. Congress, because I think the moment demands 

it, and we don’t have a lot of time. 

Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. I thank the gentleman very much. 

Let me ask this question: The temperatures in Alaska have 

warmed six degrees Fahrenheit since 1950. Could any of you comment on the role that black carbon has played in terms of the 

changes that are occurring in Alaska or in the Arctic? 

Mr. SHINDELL. That is something that, as I mentioned in my 

statement, cause and effect is very difficult to understand simply 

from observations because you only have one way that the real 

world happened to behave. So what has been happening that is distinct since the 1950’s, while concentrations of CO2 have been rising 

steadily, concentrations of different types of particulate have been 

changing, with time—after the Clean Air Act some have gone 

down—and in different locations. So we can identify the pattern 

and try to attribute cause and effect to those. The difficulty there 

is that the effect of sulfate, which is something we have controlled 

well because of acid rain, looks very similar to the pattern of black 

carbon. 

So what we can see is that, in these kind of studies, more than 

half of the rapid warming in the Arctic is attributable to particulate, but some of that is due to a reduction in sulfate and some due 

to increases in black carbon, both of which have been taking place 

largely in the last 30 years. So it is very hard to really separate 

the two. Probably a third to a half, or slightly more, is the best 

number. 

The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Ramanathan. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. I think just to echo what was said, we have 

been doing this air pollution reduction almost to speed up the 

warming. We talked about the smoke in the blanket, the sulfates 

and other aerosols act like mirrors on the blanket reflecting sunlight and shielding the greenhouse warming. 

So since 1975, we have decreased the sulfate pollution quite a 

bit, almost 25 percent globally, but just in the Arctic nations, the 

reductions in North America and Europe is almost 50 percent. So 

the unmasking of the warming is definitely contributing to the Arctic warming. 

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The second thing that has been contributing to the warming is 

that fossil fuel black carbon has increased. Not all black carbon is 

the same. The biomass black carbon cools a lot less compared to 

fossil fuel black carbon. So there are three things which are happening at the same time to contribute to the Arctic and the Alaska 

warming: One is the increase in the greenhouse gases; reduction of 

sulfur pollution and unmasking the warming; and the third is increasing the fossil fuel black carbon. So what fraction that is I have 

to leave it to modeling scientists like Dr. Shindell. 

The CHAIRMAN. Any other comments? 

The Congress, Mr. Schneider, is moving towards the encouragement of all electric vehicles, plug in hybrids. Could you talk a little 

bit about that trend and the role that that could play in reducing 

black carbon? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Sure. First of all, a lot of the discussion in this 

country around electric vehicles and plug in hybrids is in the lightduty sector. We don’t have a lot of diesel vehicles in the light-duty 

sector here as in other countries, and particularly EU. So a conversion of the light-duty fleet to more electric vehicles and more plug 

in hybrids is critical with respect to the reduction of greenhouse 

gases, but probably won’t make much of a difference with respect 

to black carbon reductions. 

Representative Sensenbrenner has a bill—it passed the House— 

that talks about hybridizing more heavy-duty vehicles, and that is 

a strategy that over a long period of time, if it was able to be successful and all the R&D and so forth worked, could have a benefit. 

But the technology immediately that could be implemented on 

heavy-duty diesels where most of the black carbon is coming from 

in this country really is the installation of the filters that I described. 

So these are all complimentary strategies, and it is important to 

look at which sector and what problem you are trying to address, 

but I think primarily the electrics and plug hybrids would be addressing greenhouse gasses from the light-duty automotive sector. 

The CHAIRMAN. The Recovery Act, the stimulus package from last February, included $300 million for projects to reduce diesel 

exhaust resulting in replacement of old dirty engines with new 

cleaner ones and in retrofitting engines to capture black carbon 

and other pollutants. There is still more to do. 

Could you outline the remaining needs in the United States and 

what we can do to reduce black carbon quickly and effectively? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Well, first of all, let me commend everyone who 

supported those provisions in the Recovery Act. That is probably 

the biggest breakthrough in terms of diesel retrofit money that 

there has been since DERA was passed. DERA was authorized at 

$1 billion. It has typically been funded in the annual appropriation 

of EPA at around $50 million to $60 million, but in the Recovery 

Act, as you said, it got $300 million. And as I said in my testimony, 

for that $300 million, the EPA received $2 billion worth of applications. So that really demonstrates that the demand is out there, 

that people want to participate in the program, both in terms of replacement and retrofits, but EPA is sitting on about $1.7 billion 

worth of applications. And their internal review suggests that 

about $1 billion of those are very high quality. 

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So we have suggested that in any jobs packages that move that 

include spending, that perhaps, like the Recovery Act, more money 

could be devoted to the Diesel Emission Reduction Act. And EPA’s 

message is, we can move $1 billion worth of these immediately because we have the applications sitting at our desk. And that would 

be probably be the fastest thing because the idea of the Recovery 

Act and the Jobs Act is to get the money out quickly to create the 

jobs. This type of DERA investment was estimated by Key Bridge 

Research to generate about 19,000 jobs per $1 billion invested, 

which is very favorable when you look at the average of the Recovery Act. So this is a win-win-win: It is a climate win. It is a public 

health win. It is a jobs win. So probably the most immediate thing 

that could be done is more funding. 

The CHAIRMAN. Who won the $300 million, Mr. Schneider? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. How do you mean? 

The CHAIRMAN. In terms of the $300 million, you said there was 

$1 billion worth of applications, who were the winners? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. First of all, there were a diverse set of winners. 

Applicants included public entities, included public-private entities. 

So, for example, a public entity, that might be a school district that 

wanted to retrofit school buses and not only protect the community, 

but protect the kids on the bus from the fumes on the bus. It would 

include municipalities that wanted to retrofit their transit buses. It 

included contractors who wanted to retrofit their construction 

fleets, and there was some success in terms of those types of 

awards. 

There were other awards in which the people used the DERA 

money almost as a Cash-for-Clunkers type of situation where they 

were able to replace existing older vehicles, scrap the older ones 

and bring in ones with a new, cleaner technology. So that would 

include some private fleets, some State government fleets, and 

some fleets that work on contracts for State governments. So there 

was a whole variety of folks in every State of the Union I believe 

that were able to—— 

The CHAIRMAN. What has been the results in terms of the implementation of the programs that the $300 million have incentivized? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Well, first of all, I think EPA is trying to calculate right now what the emissions benefits have been from that, 

and they can do that because the applications are quite detailed. 

But that money was able to be awarded very quickly. It is a reimbursement program, so it will take a little time to get the money 

out, but the orders came in and those fleets were transformed. I 

think that is the good news, is that many of those fleets were able 

to take advantage of that. And there have been announcements 

around the country where kids are riding cleaner buses to school, 

people are riding cleaner transit buses to work. Ferries have been 

retrofitted so that when they pull into their dock, the black smoke 

doesn’t infiltrate the shore. All of these things have been accomplished through the Recovery Act. 

The CHAIRMAN. So I should ask the EPA then to give me 

their—— 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Their assessment of that, yes. 

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The CHAIRMAN [continuing]. Report in terms of how successful the $300 million has been. You said that for $1 billion, it would 

create how many thousands of jobs? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Nineteen thousand. 

The CHAIRMAN. So, theoretically, then 6,000 jobs were created with the $300 million. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Correct. 

The CHAIRMAN. So I think it is important for us to get the information on that as well because, as you said, it is win, win and win. 

Thank you. 

Again, you each, I think, made some reference to the fact that 

acting on this black carbon sector should not in any way reduce our 

activities to reduce CO2 in general. So could each one of you take 

30 seconds to succinctly make your own point on that subject? 

Let me go to you, Dr. Bond. 

Ms. BOND. The fact that we should not reduce CO2 endeavors because of black carbon? We have—— 

The CHAIRMAN. No, that we should not reduce our efforts to reduce the CO2 because we are also working on the carbon issue. 

Ms. BOND. Correct. I think Mr. Schneider said it best; we need 

both and everything else that we can think of. 

Right now, we are in a position where we need to act quickly. 

We don’t have the 50 years it will take to come up with new technologies to reduce atmospheric forcing. And so black carbon is a 

quick solution, but we will still be left with the bill after putting 

CO2 into the atmosphere. We can’t afford to miss either opportunity. 

The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Ramanathan. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. It is important to recognize that black carbon 

reduction is not supplementing our prevention efforts to reduce 

CO2 simply because we are adding 35 billion tons of carbon dioxide 

every year, and it is increasing at the rate of 2 to 3 percent. If we 

don’t do anything about CO2 emissions, the CO2 concentration 

alone in this century can be double, and the warming from that 

added CO2 can exceed 2 degrees. So there is nothing BC reductions 

is going to stop this. The BC reduction is more a short-term gain 

to slow down the climate change. Ultimately, that climate change 

is from CO2, and we have to reduce it. Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Shindell. 

Mr. SHINDELL. Well, in the nineties, the U.K. introduced a public 

health law that said that anybody emitting black smoke could be 

deemed a public nuisance, meaning legally actionable. So this led 

to the City of London suing the London Underground over a power 

plant emitting black smoke, which they got out of by claiming it 

was brown. 

And I bring this up because the interesting thing about this, as 

well as being amusing, is this was the 1890s, not the 1990s. And 

we have known for a long time about the public health impact, and 

black carbon should be dealt with because it is a public health impact, whether or not it had any climate impact. There is an extra 

impetus now because climate is such a severe problem. And I don’t 

even like the expression that this buys us time because we really 

don’t have any time on the CO2 issue either. That problem is coming down the road; it is simply a different time scale. 

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That problem, since CO2 accumulates in the atmosphere and 

lasts in the atmosphere for centuries, that problem will be with us 

for a long time, even if we begin to address it right away. And so 

addressing black carbon and the other short-lived pollutants can 

help, but really has to be side by side with already immediate action on CO2. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Schneider. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Mr. Chairman, I like your metaphor about the 

house payments, down payment and monthly payments. We have 

a lot of experience in this particular area right now; if you make 

a down payment and fail to make the monthly payments, you know 

what happens. You get a foreclosure. And if we act on black carbon 

and make that down payment but we fail to make the monthly 

payments we need on greenhouse gases, our project will fail. And 

maybe we theoretically have bought ourselves a few years, but we 

will have squandered that opportunity, that down payment, if we 

don’t follow through and make the necessary reductions in greenhouse gases. It will take, as I said, both—and in order to reach the 

target levels that people say will avoid the worst effects of global 

warming. 

The CHAIRMAN. By the way, I wanted to tell you, Dr. 

Ramanathan, the reason we are having this hearing is I read this 

brilliant article that you had in Foreign Affairs. And from a public 

education perspective, if I could have 435 Members of Congress 

read it, I think that we would have a different reaction to the actions that we have to take and the recommendations for actions 

that we have to take to solve the problem but also why it is a 

smart way to go because it is something that can happen relatively 

quickly and have a big payoff as well. 

If I could go to India for a second, and maybe you could expand 

a little bit more, Dr. Ramanathan, talk a little bit more about India 

and other countries and their cooking devices and what strategy 

you would recommend to be implemented. And what percentage of 

all black carbon comes just from those cooking mechanisms that 

are used in third-world countries? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. In fact, some of the statistics I am going to 

give you come from the pioneering studies of my colleague sitting 

to my right. But we have verified it with observations collecting 

isotope data of black carbon. It turns out at least two-thirds of the 

black carbon over South Asia, which includes India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, comes from biomass burning in terms of cooking 

stoves. 

The CHAIRMAN. Did you say two-thirds from those countries or 

two-thirds for the whole world? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. Two-thirds from those countries. If you look at 

the total emissions from India, about two-thirds is from biomass 

burning. I know my own grandmother cooked with these cook 

stoves. And they do that because the food from that is the most delicious at least I have ever eaten, just like the smoked salmon here. 

So that is the reason for the difficulty changing that to LPG stoves 

and others. 

But that was the reasons given by all of the nonprofits with 

which I have interacted. But our experience based on this 1 year 

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in this selected village is that the women are tired of cooking with 

these traditional mud stoves. It simply takes a long time to collect 

the fuel, and it is a lot of work. 

And so I think the communities, at least the communities I have 

worked with, are ready. We are working with the most densely 

populated part of India. It is called the Indo-Gangetic Plain. Over 

600 million live there. 

And the other beautiful thing which is happening is the Indian 

Government has realized this is a development issue, a health 

issue. And now I have teamed up with some economists at Berkeley and Duke to show that it is also contributing to agriculture decrease of the yield. So all of this is coming together. And also the 

realization it may be impacting the glaciers is also bringing in a 

lot of communities together. 

So my personal feeling is the timing is really perfect for a major 

bilateral collaboration between U.S. and India to take it to the next 

stage. 

The CHAIRMAN. And what is the next stage? How can Americans 

change Indian cooking habits? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. I think the change can happen, my feeling, is 

through technology, transfer of the stoves, and there are various 

ways to do that. And there are also ways we can remove the black 

carbon from the chimneys, and so let them use. And the third is, 

of course, funding. Those three. 

And the fourth I want to mention, the key thing is what we are 

doing; we have to document how much of the health we are saving, 

exposure studies. And we have to document how much global 

warming benefit will you get. My personal calculation suggests removing 1 ton of black carbon in those villages will have the same 

effect as removing thousands of tons of carbon dioxide, in terms of 

global warming. And these are theoretical calculations. So there 

are a number of scientific engineering, and just the question of giving loans to 150 million. So there are a variety of ways in which 

bilateral collaboration could just push it to the front page. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. 

Cleaver. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I apologize, I am running between committees. I always like this 

committee and try to get here under almost any circumstances because of how significant it is. 

I walked in on this conversation. My family is in Tanzania, 

Arusha, about 400 miles south of Nairobi and at the foot of Mount 

Kilimanjaro. I stood out one evening with one of my relatives, and 

we looked up at the moon. And we could actually see the outline 

of craters. And I said to him, you are fortunate in many ways over 

the Western World because there is no pollution. I think, in 

Arusha, average income is $1,500 a year; there may be 10 cars. I 

mean, if I am underestimating, let’s say 100 cars on the high side, 

and yet I get on this committee and start learning about the soot 

that is there because my cousins cook outside. I mean, everybody 

is cooking outside. In fact, my cousin, believe it or not, in Africa 

is running a barbecue business, and so people line up outside, and 

nobody is thinking about what is going on. 

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But the concern I have is, it is low-hanging fruit. We can probably eliminate that intrusion into the atmosphere, black carbon, 

but how do we do it? It is something that we know we can do if 

we can just change the culture and also provide some kind of way 

for cooking that does not pollute, but it is going to cost money. I 

am thinking about my cousin or any of my relatives, they would 

easily probably go to another form of cooking if they could afford 

it. 

And so, in the absence of having the money, what do we do? I 

mean, is it something that the United States and the polluters, the 

big polluters—India, China, Europe—is that our responsibility, or 

are there any suggestions? I will go tell them. You tell me what 

to do, and I will go tell them. I know the mayor. Anybody. 

Ms. BOND. First of all, this is a big problem, of course. This is 

about half the people in the world. And there are places to target 

first to move rapidly. One of those areas is high-population density 

where that kind of cooking leads to high concentrations and impacts on quite a lot of people. And so it is easier to deliver to those 

groups of people than it would be to deliver to your cousin, who has 

a barbecue at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro—forgive me if I have 

gotten your geography a bit wrong. 

Mr. CLEAVER. No, you are right. 

Ms. BOND. Now, Mr. Markey asked about the role of the United 

States. There is some funding needed, but we are also in a really 

good position to develop enabling technologies. For example, we 

find that a better stove can be made not by making a great stove 

here and delivering it there or by paying them to make a stove, but 

by developing capability to build mass production for a combustion 

chamber so that people there can build their own stoves, but the 

critical piece is made possible. 

And so if you think of this as a large-scale problem and we have 

to solve every single household, it seems big and almost undoable. 

I think the role of the United States can be in identifying targeted 

research and targeted studies and targeted development for those 

things that are keeping new, clean, better technologies from 

spreading. And I don’t want to underestimate the role of clean fuels 

as well as clean technology; clean fuel means not only modern 

fuels, but also methods for working on crop waste and creating pellets and that sort of thing. So I think we have the vision and we 

have the capability and we have a history of identifying those trigger points that make a big difference. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. May I add to that, Mr. Chairman? 

Mr. CLEAVER. Yes, please, Doctor. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. First thing to recognize is that they are using 

the most environmental friendly fuel because it is not adding carbon dioxide to the air if you are cooking with crop residues and cow 

dung mixture. 

And the cost of these stoves is such that, I think of, for example, 

India, 750 million depend on this, 150 million households. It is a 

$4 billion problem. So to me, I think it is a solvable problem. You 

are not talking about trillions. We are not talking about hundreds 

of billions; with clever micro credits and others, we could distribute 

this. 

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One thing I want to talk to you about is the brown clouds or the 

haze you saw covering Kilimanjaro. In Africa, part of the source of 

this black carbon is savanna burning. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Is what? 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. Savanna burning, so that contributes quite a 

bit to that Africa-wide haze, plus the cooking, both those sources. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Let me follow up. 

When I used to have knees, I could go up to the top of Kilimanjaro, and if any of you have done it, you know you start at the bottom, and you are in very tropical clothing because the temperature 

is going to be at the century mark. The higher you go, the colder 

it gets, and so you start changing. By the time you get to the top, 

you are on snow. That was a while back. Now you get to the top, 

and you may see little sprinkles of snow. The snow on Kilimanjaro, 

it hasn’t completely vanished, but it is going there. 

In reading through the testimony and becoming a little more familiar with this issue, I started wondering, in this land where the 

Kilimanjaro Airport is not far from the mountain, and I am starting to think maybe more planes are landing here, maybe that is 

what is doing the damage. Because there is no industry. The industry there is the Western World stealing all the water to do plants 

so that we can have fresh plants in hotels every morning, but that 

is other another whole issue. 

So I am wondering if what causes that haze is the same thing 

that is causing the melting of the snow. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. I will comment on that. First, you have to understand, when you see the haze above your head, particularly if 

it is above a mile, it may have nothing to do with the local source. 

These things transport over thousands of kilometers. 

For example, in the dry season, between October to April, the entire Arabian Sea and the North Indian Ocean is filled with haze. 

It is transported both from the South Asian side and from Africa. 

We have seen elevated regions of the Himalayas covered with thick 

brown clouds. We have been there. We have taken pictures with 

aircraft. 

So the issue of the whole Kilimanjaro, as you know, its retreat, 

originally it used to be thought it was all due to global warming. 

Now, some glaciologists have estimated at least half of that, a lot 

of it is coming from really what we call sublimation, just the air 

becoming dry and the snow evaporating. 

So there are multiple causes happening in Kilimanjaro, but I 

would point out, no one has taken a look at really what this black 

carbon is doing to that retreat. It is an area, new research to find 

out. But we know from satellite images that soot looms hover 

around the Kilimanjaro region. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Dr. Shindell. 

Mr. SHINDELL. I was going to comment on the previous question 

a little bit, which was, if, say, the Waxman-Markey bill becomes 

law in this country, there will be a price on carbon, like there is 

in much of the world. I would think that it is not necessarily a useful thing to link funding that has been associated with the greenhouse gases that are controlled under the Kyoto Protocol, the clean 

development mechanism whereby the United States and other 

wealthy countries pay for reductions in other countries; I don’t 

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think it makes sense to link those with the short-term pollutants 

like black carbon because, as we have talked about, they operate 

on very different time scales. 

But analogous sources, for example, there was an editorial in the 

Wall Street Journal about a global methane fund, where the U.S. 

could help other countries to pay for reductions or a global black 

carbon fund. I think all of these kind of ways that the United 

States can help the developing world to do things, like intervene 

in residential cooking stoves, are quite sensible, but I really think 

we need partners there. 

I am chair of a United Nations environment program assessment 

of the effects of black carbon and ozone on climate. And what we 

are really trying to do is bring in the developing world scientists, 

as Dr. Bond was mentioning, and there is capacity there, too. I 

think if those scientists are able to convince their countries that 

these things are really in their own best interests because they are 

damaging their ability to grow crops to feed their population and 

they are affecting their development goals by air pollution—one of 

the leading causes of adverse health impacts in the developing 

world—if it is in their own interest and there is this additional 

kind of carrot of having funding from developing nations to help 

them do something about it, I think that is a combination that 

would actually help to get something done. 

Mr. CLEAVER. It is a major challenge because the people who live 

in this area, the Maasai Tribe, which inhabits this particular area, 

they know nothing about global warming. I mean, you may as well 

keep speaking English because they have no idea what you are 

talking about when you start talking about global warming because 

all they know is that the snow on the mountain is not as thick as 

it used to be. That is all they know. And they have not had any 

intellectual conversations or debates about it, and nobody is bringing the issue forth. It is a challenge to us because I think we are 

partially responsible for much of what they experience. I simply 

wanted to get some kind of reading on this because I guess maybe 

I am personally involved in it and was hoping that—and I still hold 

that hope—that the Waxman-Markey bill will be approved, and if 

we need to tweak it later. 

I like a world black carbon fund idea. I think if we tweak it later, 

it can be the major step to save the planet. 

Anyway, thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Cleaver, very much. 

Here is what I am going to do; I am going to ask each one of you 

to give us your 1-minute summation of what it is that you want 

us to remember, which is a test because you have a lot that you 

want us to know about these subjects. We will go in the reverse 

order of the opening statements. 

And we will begin with you, Mr. Schneider. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. 

I am going to just tick off the policy pieces that you really asked 

me to address today. 

The first one is funding through the climate bill, if we are lucky 

enough to have one, funding for the Diesel Emission Reduction Act 

and through the Jobs bill, a reauthorization in funding, and funding through a transportation bill, reauthorization, which requires 

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clean construction equipment and funds it as a part of that transportation bill. 

And then, lastly, giving the EPA the regulatory authority to 

cover more of the existing in-use diesels that could require the use 

of today’s technology to reduce the black carbon emissions from 

them. We have had a good discussion just now about the cook stove 

issue; I am not going to add to that. I do talk about the black carbon fund in my written testimony, so I would refer you to that. 

And then, lastly, we haven’t talked as much about the agriculture burning issue. That is an issue that deserves more attention. It is going to require international cooperation and enforcement of national laws in other countries to really accomplish that, 

but we probably can’t get the full benefits of black carbon reduction 

unless we address that. 

Thank you very much for the time today, I appreciate it. 

The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Shindell. 

Mr. SHINDELL. Well, I would start by reiterating that we have 

two problems: a long-term climate change problem and a near-term 

climate change problem. And we can’t deal with the long-term 

problem without beginning to reduce carbon dioxide emissions as 

soon as possible. 

But for the near-term problem, I think that consideration of the 

short-lived warming agents, as we are talking about today, and not 

just black carbon, but also methane, carbon monoxide and volatile 

organic carbons, which are also emitted by similar processes—for 

example, the diesel particulate filters we have been talking about 

substantially reduce about 90 percent black carbon, but also carbon 

monoxide and volatile organics. So if you target all of these as a 

basket, you are likely to make more effective decisions, reductions 

that can lead to significant improvements in air quality as well as 

mitigating climate change. 

And I just repeat the summary of my testimony, that reductions 

in emissions of products of incomplete combustion will virtually always improve health. And if targeting emissions that are rich in 

black carbon, carbon monoxide, VOCs and methane, you can often 

find options whose co-benefits are so large that they can simultaneously mitigate climate change and improve air quality at substantially reduced cost. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Dr. Ramanathan. 

Mr. RAMANATHAN. The Copenhagen Accord requires us to limit 

climate change to less than 2 degrees from pre-Industrial. We have 

already put enough greenhouse gases on the planet, according to 

our climate models, they would already warm the planet by 2 degrees. So we are losing time. So we have a Herculean task in front 

of us to meet the Copenhagen Accord, and I consider black carbon 

reductions as an important component of our battle to meet that 

2 degree warming. 

Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Dr. Bond. 

Ms. BOND. Thank you very much. 

We have discussed some emission sources that produce black carbon and other pollutants. And we have also discussed how there is 

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the long-term and the short-term effect. What I really want you to 

think about is that we have a portfolio of potential solutions that 

can address climate change in the long term and the short term. 

So don’t think about either/or; think about, how will we manage 

the atmospheric trajectory during our lifetimes and your children’s 

lifetimes and our grandchildren’s lifetimes? And our lifetime is a 

significant component of that and of interest to many people. 

The United States has the opportunity to lead in both technology 

and in engagement internationally in this endeavor. There are 

ways to improve both climate and human welfare at the same time. 

I will leave it there. We have a lot in front of us, but we have a 

lot of solutions, and I think we have a lot of opportunities. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much. 

And a lot of opportunities to create new jobs, a lot of opportunities to engage in technological transfer, a lot of incredibly great 

side benefits from working on this problem if we do so in a way 

that sees the opportunities as well. 

We thank all of you for your tremendous testimony and for your 

incredible work on this subject. That is what made it possible for 

us to have this hearing today. 

With that, this hearing is adjourned. Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 11:40 a.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

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WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 145 here 62588A.080
110 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 146 here 62588A.081
111 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 147 here 62588A.082
112 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 148 here 62588A.083
113 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 149 here 62588A.084
114 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 150 here 62588A.085
115 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 151 here 62588A.086
116 


WReier-Aviles on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with HEARINGInsert offset folio 152 62588A.087