With public interest in climate change reaching new highs during the summit in Copenhagen, today's NASA Image of the Day, showing the distribution of black carbon over the earth's northern hemisphere, assumes added relevance. Black carbon, better known as soot, is thought to be the second largest contributor to global warming after CO2. Found globally but concentrated over Asia, black carbon enters the atmosphere through burning of fossil fuels such as coal and diesel, and biofuels such as wood.
(Photograph: NASA)
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