Pollution

Shutdowns in response to the Covid-19 pandemic have resulted in lowered air pollution levels around the world. Researchers at MIT, and in Germany and Singapore have found that this resulted in a significant increase in the output from solar photovoltaic installations in Delhi, normally one of the world’s smoggiest cities.

Covid-19 shutdown led to increased solar power output

As the air cleared after lockdowns, solar installations in Delhi produced 8 percent more power, study shows.

July 22, 2020

Sahag Voskian SM ’15, PhD ’19 (left) and Professor T. Alan Hatton have developed an electrochemical cell that can capture and release carbon dioxide with just a small change in voltage.

A new approach to carbon capture

Researchers design an effective treatment for both exhaust and ambient air.

July 9, 2020

MINE Program students and other program participants at a hackathon in Salvador, Brazil, are pictured here before the Covid-19 pandemic interrupted such gatherings.

Innovations in environmental training for the mining industry

MIT Environmental Solutions Initiative and multinational mining company Vale bring sustainability education to young engineering professionals in Brazil.

July 7, 2020

Graduate student Linda Zhong works in Professor Anthony Sinskey’s biology lab on an answer for plastic pollution.

Unlocking the secrets of a plastic-eater

Graduate student Linda Zhong and professor of biology Anthony Sinskey are studying the plastic-devouring enzyme PETase as a way to improve recycling.

June 8, 2020

In this photo, Alison Hoyt stands on top of a log during a research trip in a peat swamp forest in Borneo. Tropical peatlands are permanently flooded forest lands, where the debris of fallen leaves and branches is preserved by the wet environment and continues to accumulate for centuries, rather than continually decomposing as it does in dryland forests.

Peatland drainage in Southeast Asia adds to climate change

Study reveals drainage, deforestation of the region’s peatlands, which leads to fires, greenhouse emissions, land subsidence.

June 4, 2020

Beyond the hyper-rational debates of "jobs vs. environment" — and based on her own family heritage and home territory — MIT anthropologist Amy Moran-Thomas illuminates "the cultural underpinnings that have allowed anti-science propaganda to gain traction in America and continue in the face of mounting evidence."

Associate Professor Amy Moran-Thomas receives the 2020 Levitan Prize in the Humanities

The award will support the MIT anthropologist's research on the cultural dimensions of climate denialism.

April 24, 2020

Humpback whales have seen a major rebound in numbers, thanks to conservation efforts, from a few hundred left in the 1970s to tens of thousands at present.

3 Questions: Greg Britten on how marine life can recover by 2050

Committing to aggressive conservation efforts could rebuild ocean habitats and species populations in a few decades.

April 3, 2020

MIT researchers have found that much of the current emission of CFC-11 and CFC-12 likely stems from large CFC “banks” — old equipment such as building insulation foam, refrigerators and cooling systems, and foam insulation, that was manufactured before the global phaseout of CFCs and is still leaking the gases into the atmosphere.

Emissions of several ozone-depleting chemicals are larger than expected

Recovering and safely destroying the sources of these chemicals could speed ozone recovery and reduce climate change.

March 17, 2020

MIT graduate student Emily Hanhauser demonstrates a new device that may simplify the logistics of water monitoring for trace metal contaminants, particularly in resource-constrained regions.

Instrument may enable mail-in testing to detect heavy metals in water

Whisk-shaped device absorbs trace contaminants, preserves them in dry state that can be shipped to labs for analysis.

February 25, 2020

New MIT study finds more than half of all air-quality-related early deaths in the United States are a result of cross-state pollution, or emissions originating outside of the state in which those deaths occur.

Half of U.S. deaths related to air pollution are linked to out-of-state emissions

Study tracks pollution from state to state in the 48 contiguous United States.

February 12, 2020

An Army Corps of Engineers flood model depicting the Ala Wai watershed after a 100-year rain event. The owner of a local design firm described the Ala Wai Flood Control Project as the largest climate impact project in Hawai's modern history.

Reducing risk, empowering resilience to disruptive global change

Workshop highlights how MIT research can guide adaptation at local, regional, and national scales.

January 23, 2020

The AES Corporation, based in Virginia, installed the world’s largest solar-plus-storage system on the southern end of the Hawaiian island of Kauai. A scaled-down version was first tested at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

Pathways to a low-carbon future

A new study looks at how the global energy mix could change over the next 20 years.

January 9, 2020

Assistant Professor Valerie Karplus and her collaborators have demonstrated that measurements of air pollutants taken by NASA satellites are often a good indicator of emissions on the ground. Their approach provides regulators with a low-cost tool to ensure that industrial firms are complying with emissions standards.

Tracking emissions in China

Evaluating a 2014 policy change yields some good news and some concerns.

December 30, 2019

Members of the winning team, ecoTrio, from this year’s MADMEC competition. From left to right are Margaret Lee, Sara Sheffels, and Ty Christoff-Tempesta.

MADMEC teams address plastic waste problem with materials science

Finalists presented an alternative to nondegradable plastics, and an additive to help plastics decompose.

October 17, 2019

Renewlogy co-founder and CEO Priyanka Bakaya inside one of the company's commercial plants, which are capable of processing ten tons of plastic each day to create about 60 barrels of fuel.

MIT alumna addresses the world’s mounting plastic waste problem

Renewlogy’s system is converting plastic waste from cities and rivers into fuel.

October 9, 2019

MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology - On Campus and Around the world

Browse By

Topics

Departments

Centers, Labs, & Programs

Schools

Topic