There are two effects here:

1. Some pollutants increase simply because higher temperatures cause the reactions which form them to run faster
2. Getting rid of combustion prevents the emission of pollutants which don’t have a meaningful climate impact in addition to preventing the emission of CO2, which does. This is a co-benefit of electrification, and doing something like moving to e-fuels would mean seeing the same problems for human health.

I wish the article did a better job of explaining this, which is why I didn’t post it when first published.

Environmental Protection Agency moved to repeal the Obama-era “endangerment finding,” a declaration that because carbon emissions and other greenhouse gases (like methane) endanger public health and welfare, the government is justified in using the Clean Air Act to regulate them.

GHGs are not “pollutants”. GHG warming does create earlier springs (melt season) and drier forests from which fires can spread wider, and pollutants drifting where people live. The clean air act was still the wrong framework to try to extend to GHGs because it applies to pollutants, and assholes would reverse it.

One thing I was not aware before is ozone. It is not visible and levels become much higher on sunny days, because of photochemical smog. And if you have asthma, for example, you will feel it because accepted quantities are toxic to the lungs.

Also, because the chemicals that catalyze the creation of ozone in the sun, also help to reduce it during the night, ozone levels in the suburbs and in the countryside near cities are often much higher in the morning, than in the city. Not healthy any more to do sports in such mornings.

If there is missing any argument for people in the suburbs why we should reduce cars in cities, this is it: Ozone from air pollution is really bad for their health and for their children.

That’s why I took up smoking. If any deadly gases go into my lungs I want it to be my own choice dammit.