Air pollution costs lives, researchers say HIGHLIGHTS N.C. BREATHE conference Friday at UNCC Center City Air pollution contributes to 5.5 million deaths a year worldwide BY BRUCE HENDERSON [email protected] Recent findings underscore the cost of air pollution on human health, and the benefits of reducing it, researchers said Friday at the N.C. BREATHE conference in Charlotte. While pollution is rarely a direct cause of death, it raises risks that can shave years off an individual’s life. One recent study placed air pollution as the fifth-highest risk factor globally, contributing to 5.5 million deaths in 2013. The first BREATHE conference was held in Raleigh last year. It moved to UNC Charlotte Center City as UNCC’s “Keeping Watch” initiative focuses this year on air quality, said June Blotnick of Clean Air Carolina, one of the event’s sponsors. Air pollutants come to life on the side of the UNCC Center City building each night through April 23. The “Particle Falls” animation measures fine airborne particles in real time and displays them in a stream of light. Fine particles, which come from dust, motor vehicles or industries, are particularly lethal. One-thirtieth the width of a human hair, they work deeply into the lungs and were linked to 3.2 million deaths worldwide in 2010, said scientist Antonella Zanobetti of Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Zanobetti cited a study showing that exposure to particles is more likely to lead to hospitalization for patients with Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease. A second study, of New Englanders over 65, linked increased deaths even when particles are within federal standards. Because pollutants circulate widely in the atmosphere, air pollution poses global health problems, said UNC Chapel Hill’s Jason West. Ozone pollution from North America and Europe causes more deaths elsewhere than in the regions where it originated. Taking steps to control greenhouse gases linked to climate change can have the added benefit of curbing air pollution. West recently led a study that found that controlling methane can reduce premature deaths by curbing the formation of ozone. Because it’s expensive to control air pollutants, costs are weighed against public health benefits when federal standards are proposed. That’s the field of Chris Timmins, a Duke University environmental economist. The last major overhaul of federal clean-air standards, in 1990, cost industries $65 billion in compliance expenses, he said. But the benefits, including fewer premature deaths and work days lost to illness, have been calculated at $2 trillion. Charlotte)Observer) ) April)8,)2016) Exhibition: Stop taking air for granted – or else BY BARBARA SCHREIBER Correspondent We often take our air and trees for granted. But in a rapidly changing city such as Charlotte, they are vulnerable. “Keeping Watch on Air” aims at making us mindful of these interconnected life essentials. The exhibition, at UNCC’s Center City, is the final installment of “Keeping Watch,” a three- year multidisciplinary effort that brings together community, institutional and corporate partners to enlighten Charlotteans about pressing environmental concerns. (The first two were “Keeping Watch on Plastics” and “Keeping Watch on Water.”) Visual art is a huge part of this initiative. This year’s highlight is “Particle Falls,” a multi-story projection on the Center City Building exterior. The work of University of New Mexico artist/scientist Andrea Polli, it has been presented internationally since 2010. On view since mid-March, it dazzles, whether or not passersby know what it’s about; but once they do, they find it eye-opening and sobering. “Particle Falls” makes the invisible visible. It takes data from a nephelometer (a device that measures nearby particle pollution) and renders it, via software Polli designed, as a vivid, real- time visualization that is updated every 15 seconds. The projection resembles a waterfall of light. When air quality is good, there is only a cascade of blue. If there is some degree of pollution, white sparkles appear. When air quality is poor, such as when the nephelometer picks up exhaust from a passing diesel truck, the waterfall becomes a firefall. “Particle Falls” is visible from dusk to dawn. During the day you can view a small version of it in Center City’s Projective Eye Gallery. Intentionally or not, “Particle Falls” is highly symbolic of our state of denial. There are the obvious extremes of the idyllic waterfall and the chaotic firefall. But the middle ground – the pollution we accept or ignore because it allows us to enjoy such indulgences as single- Charlotte)Viewpoint) ) March)14,)2016) Gallery visitors interact with Jed Berk’s Blubber Bots at the opening of “Keeping Watch on Air.” pollution we accept or ignore because it allows us to enjoy such indulgences as single- occupancy cars – is enticingly pretty. At Projective Eye Gallery, an exhibition of work by regional, national and international artists complements “Particle Falls.” Gallery visitors can interact with “Blubber Bots,” Jed Berk’s small robotic blimps, at designated times; otherwise, they are docked at the end of the gallery, where they bob gently in the air. Highly responsive to light, people and air currents, they can be playful or menacing. Although their link to the show’s theme seems tenuous, they are among the most engaging works here, with their blending of art, technology, interactivity and humor. Three artists address various challenges in the lives of trees. “Memory,” a tree constructed from lumber mill detritus, occupies both the gallery and part of the lobby stairway. The work of Charlie Brouwer, it reflects both yearning and anger, with its evocation of a treehouse and references to clear-cutting. Linda Foard Roberts’ “Spared,” a multi-panel photo of a majestic tree with a ribbon tied around it, is filled with hope. The ribbon is likely a signal for developers not to remove the tree, but it also transforms the tree into a gift. Robert Wiens’s watercolors of rotting logs depict trees left in peace and at their natural endpoint, providing sustenance to insects and other plants. Photorealistic from a distance, they are painterly and energetic up close. “Particle Matter,” by Kristin Rothrock, fills the building’s window gallery. These woodcuts on Japanese paper seem decorative, but they depict toxins. The prints are circular, as if viewed under Charlotte)Viewpoint) ) March)14,)2016) a microscope. The gallery’s showstopper is Berndnaut Smilde’s “Nimbus Dumont.” Smilde creates clouds in building interiors and then photographs them. His images are often printed on 4-by-5-foot aluminum sheets, but at Projective Eye, “Nimbus Dumont” is printed on wallpaper and is nearly 10 by 14 feet. The effect is startling, combining the wonder of an indoor cloud (which appears to be an element of nature trying to reclaim its territory) and the strangeness of a portal to a nonexistent space. Unlike previous “Keeping Watch” exhibitions, which were explicit in their mission to educate, this show is a collection of observations and musings. While it has moments that teach and inform, it also is by turns thoughtful, celebratory and even funny. Charlotte)Viewpoint) ) March)14,)2016) Trees, Air in Spotlight at KEEPING WATCH Exhibit by John Schacht March 14, 2016 Photos: (above) Linda Foard Roberts' portrait "Spared" in four panels; (below) Charlie Brower recreates trees using "slabwood," leftovers from lumber mills. Dave Cable, executive director of TreesCharlotte, is looking for ways that the four-year-old group can broaden community awareness and safeguard Charlotte's tree canopy. June Lambla, founder and curator for Lambla artWORKS, wants to celebrate what Charlotte is already doing to heighten awareness about the importance of trees to the local ecosystem and sustainable living policies in general. And photographer Linda Foard Roberts is so drawn to certain trees that she includes them in her artwork as though they were family members—because for the long-time Charlotte native, their roots are the same. Together with a host of other artists, non-profits and UNC Charlotte's Urban Institute and College of Arts + Architecture, these Charlotteans find their paths and corresponding messages converging in KEEPING WATCH, a combined art show/initiative which this year covers local air quality and tree canopy. Previous KEEPING WATCH programs highlighted plastics and recycling in 2014, and urban streams and creeks in 2015. So far this year, Andrea Polli's Particle Falls—which went up March 4 and is on display through Earth Day, April 23—has drawn most of the attention by providing real-time measurements of air particulates in the form of an animated 8-story waterfall of light projected onto the side of the UNC Charlotte Center City building. But Particle Falls and air quality are just one part of KEEPING WATCH's environmental and artistic equation. On Friday, March 18—Arbor Day, coincidentally—the Projective Eye Gallery in the building beneath Polli's display will further explore air and tree canopy issues through the artistic visions of Roberts and four other artists (the exhibit also runs through April 23). In addition to Californian Jed Berk’s interactive floating "Blubber Bots" that make the air tangible, and Dutchman Berndnaut Smilde’s wall-sized photograph of the ephemeral indoor clouds he painstakingly creates, Virginian Charlie Brower addresses issues of mature tree canopy and clear-cutting with a life-size tree constructed from lumber mill detritus. Likewise, Canadian Robert Wiens’s life-like watercolors of tree segments highlight issues of deforestation and conservation, while Roberts’s large-format photographic images of a grand, mature tree evokes our emotional attachments to trees. The interests of Cable, Lambla and Roberts could also be said to converge in Charlotte's oldest neighborhoods, where majestic 100-year-old willow oaks—most were planted between 1895-1923— Charlotte)Viewpoint) ) March)14,)2016) throw their branches over the posh homes and winding roadways in an embrace that's as emblematic for Charlotte as the Eifel Tower is for Paris or Central Park for New York City.