Practical Paths towards Lowering Black Carbon Emissions

Black carbon (BC) aerosol, accounting for a minor fraction of atmospheric aerosols, is attracting increased attention due to its impact on air quality, human health, and climate change. Focusing on BC emission reduction, this paper gives a brief introduction to the sources and global distribution of BC. Along with the decrease of BC emissions from such actions as the reduction of global greenhouse gases (GHGs) and regulating local air quality, it also highlights other BC reduction approaches such as control and improvement of combustion conditions, the elimination of open biomass burning, and the sequestration of BC by biomass pyrolysis. Finally, it is stressed that at this moment there is no enough reason to push BC reduction into any climate change related negotiations, although BC has been included in some of so-called win-win reduction targets for the quick response to both climate and non-climate appeals.