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Climate change is a long-term threat that requires global action. Old-fashioned air pollution is an immediate threat, one which kills millions of people a year right now, and which can be helped with local action near the affected people.

So yes, air pollution is not only more important, but also easier to fix.

If anyone disagrees, go visit one of these cities. A few days of burning nasal passages and you probably won't be able to pay much attention to the decades-distant consequences of climate change.




Seems like both of them might be worth fixing and at least part of the solution is the same.


Definitely, and I certainly wouldn't argue against taking action against CO2 emissions because local air pollution is a bigger problem. Fight both, and where possible find solutions that help both.

The tradeoffs tend to be in smaller fixes anyway. With diesel engines, there's a point where you may have to choose between more CO2 and fewer particulates, or more particulates and less CO2. But obviously both will be improved greatly if you replace that with an electric motor and batteries charged by CO2-neutral energy.


The trade-off in diesel engines is between more CO2 and more nitrogen oxides. Burning lean mixtures with lots of excess oxygen tends to reduce both particulates (since they are more completely burned) and CO2 (since combustion is more efficient) at a cost of nitrogen-oxygen side reactions.




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