In these days delegates from all over the world are gathered in Paris where the twenty-first session of the Conference of the Parties (COP) and the eleventh session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (CMP) are taking place.
The ultimate objective of both treaties is to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that will prevent dangerous human interference with the climate system. Most of the attention is on atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), the most abundant greenhouse gas, which has recently passed the concentration of 400 ppm.
However, it is important to underline how climate-relevant short-lived compounds such as light-absorbing particulate BC and ozone are at the same time air pollutants affecting human health and climate-forcing (positive and negative) agents. Therefore, measures to mitigate air quality and climate change must necessarily be integrated in order to effectively tackle these two important issues.
Further readings:
http://www.unep.org/dewa/Portals/67/pdf/BlackCarbon_report.pdf
http://www.nature.com/news/air-pollution-clean-up-our-skies-1.16352
