Title: Finding Air Pollution Culprits: Science, Communication and Policy Impact
Speaker: Jurgita Ovadnevaite, University of Galway, Ireland
When: 10 April 2025, 15:00–16:00 plus time for questions and mingle
Where: LINXS, The Loop, Rydbergs torg 4, 224 84 Lund, with digital participation possibility (Zoom). Registered participants (online-only) will receive a Zoom link before the event.
Abstract
Does the current popular age for biomass to mitigate climate change mark a grim future for human health?
Atmospheric aerosol particles, contributing to over 8 million premature deaths per year, are central to the cause of the two greatest risks to our environment: air pollution and climate change. The risks are closely interlinked as some potentially toxic particulate air pollutants also act as climate forcers, hence, mitigating one influences the other. The fact is reinforced by our discovery that extreme air pollution events are driven by the ‘green’, ‘carbon neural’ fuels (peat and wood) with disproportionate contribution to pollution levels. Inauspiciously, however, policymakers still struggle to formulate co-beneficial strategies tackling both issues collectively. Historically, in Ireland, climate research was decoupled from air quality – but the Centre for Climate and Air Pollution Studies (C-CAPS), led by Prof. Jurgita Ovadnevaite, is at the forefront of bridging this gap with the integrated network approach.
In her talk, Jurgita Ovadnevaite will present the latest C-CAPS achievements in fingerprinting aerosols to identify main air pollution culprits and how this, together with public engagement to change an understanding and perception of air pollution, has enabled the latest air policy changes in Ireland. Jurgita is not a trained communicator so she will share her personal path and experience, from the perspective of a physicist, in how to reach out to public and policy makers to enable societal and policy impacts.
Bio
Jurgita Ovadnevaite is an Associate Professor at the School of Natural Sciences, University of Galway, and a director of the Ryan Institute’s Centre for Climate and Air Pollution Studies (C-CAPS), where she leads the Aerosol Mass Spectrometry field and the National Aerosol Mass Spectrometry Network. Her work is focused on elucidating aerosol particle sources and impacts on climate, air quality and health. She is a PI and/or WP leader on a number of major National and EU grants; publishes her research in high profile international journals (Nature, Nature Sustainability, Nature Geoscience and others) and acts there as a reviewer. She has presented her work at numerous international conferences, where she was a plenary and invited speaker. She is a member of International Committee on Nucleation and Atmospheric Aerosols and the International SOLAS Scientific Steering and Management Committees. Jurgita is leading the source apportionment theme in the National Research Forum in Ireland. She is a contributing author to the latest IPCC Assessment Report. Last but not least, Jurgita and her group thrives in providing scientific evidence for policy change and implementation and has worked closely with policymakers in the Republic of Ireland (the EPA and the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications) to enable recent Air policy changes there (i.e. New Solid Fuel Regulations 2022).
Contact: Please contact shandana.mufti@linxs.lu.se for any practical questions.
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