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Toxic Haze Engulfs Northern China, PM2.5 Air Warning Issued

air quality northern China

As a toxic haze engulfed key cities in northern China on Tuesday, authorities issued their strongest air pollution warnings, warning the public that visibility might decrease to less than 50 metres (164 feet).

The northern province of Hebei issued an anti-pollution emergency response, specifying traffic safety regulations for when necessary, including suspending flight takeoffs and landings, temporarily blocking highways, and suspending ferries, China’s meteorology agency stated in a notification.

Authorities also advised motorists to pull over in a safe parking spot when conditions called for it and recommended residents to remain indoors.

If the capital issues its highest air pollution warning, Beijing has indicated it will execute traffic control measures.

For a few days, heavy smog covered the country’s north, as autumn temperatures surged to usual early summer levels nearing 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) in some parts.

Air quality china

Experts believe that weak cold air currents from the north pole were a major cause of the strange weather.

As air pollution levels in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei area and the northern section of Henan province reached moderate to severe levels, pollution control specialists claimed increasing industrial activities, heavy trucking, and crop fires had all contributed to the haze, according to official television CCTV.

Regional electricity consumption increased by 5% in late October compared to the first half of the month, with circumstances worsening in the cement, brick, and tile industries.

The National Meteorological Centre (NMC) reported severe fog in parts of Tianjin municipality, Hebei and Shandong provinces, as well as eastern regions of Jiangsu province, resulting in visibility of less than 1 km (0.62 mile) on Tuesday morning.

Light to moderate haze will continue to envelop the centre and southern parts of China’s northern region until Thursday, with severe haze anticipated in the central parts, according to the NMC.

Cold air currents are expected to rush in from the north beginning Thursday night, providing conditions that could decrease and evaporate the haze, according to the weather forecaster.

Air quality China

PM2.5 Air Quality in China

Smog in China has been a significant environmental issue for many years. Smog is a type of air pollution that is characterized by a mixture of smoke and fog, primarily composed of pollutants such as particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10) and ground-level ozone. The main sources of smog in China are industrial emissions, vehicular pollution, and coal-fired power plants.

China has faced significant air quality challenges, particularly related to PM2.5 pollution. PM2.5 refers to particulate matter with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or smaller, which can be inhaled into the lungs and pose serious health risks. These particles can come from various sources, including industrial emissions, vehicle exhaust, construction activities, and natural sources like dust and wildfires.

Despite these efforts, some regions in China still experience periods of poor air quality, particularly during the winter when coal heating and weather conditions can lead to smog and high PM2.5 levels. It’s important to note that air quality can vary greatly from one city to another and from season to season in China.

Efforts to improve air quality in China are ongoing, and the country continues to work on reducing PM2.5 levels and the associated health risks. The effectiveness of these measures varies by region, and continued vigilance and action are necessary to address air pollution and its impact on public health.

In recent years, China has made efforts to address its air quality issues, which have been a major public health concern.

Several factors have contributed to the severity of smog in China:

  1. Industrialization: China’s rapid industrialization and economic growth have led to increased industrial emissions. Many factories and industries release pollutants into the atmosphere, contributing to air pollution.
  2. Coal consumption: China has been heavily reliant on coal for its energy needs. Burning coal for power generation and heating has been a major source of air pollution. The use of low-quality coal in some regions has exacerbated the problem.
  3. Vehicle emissions: The rapid increase in the number of vehicles on Chinese roads has led to higher levels of air pollution from exhaust emissions. The use of vehicles with outdated emissions standards and a lack of stringent regulation has aggravated the issue.
  4. Geography and weather: Certain geographical and meteorological conditions can exacerbate smog in China. For example, Beijing is surrounded by mountains, which can trap pollutants and prevent them from dispersing. Stagnant weather conditions, such as temperature inversions, can also trap pollutants closer to the ground.

The Chinese government has recognized the severity of the smog problem and has taken various measures to address it. These measures include stricter emission standards for industries and vehicles, efforts to reduce coal consumption, the promotion of clean energy sources, and the implementation of regional smog control plans. Additionally, China has invested in air quality monitoring and public awareness campaigns to tackle air pollution.

While progress has been made in reducing smog levels in some regions, it remains a significant environmental challenge in parts of China, especially during the winter months when heating demands are high. Efforts to improve air quality continue to be a priority for the Chinese government, as smog has negative impacts on public health, the environment, and overall quality of life

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Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding, But Still Accounting 48% Search Revenue

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Google is so closely associated with its key product that its name is a verb that signifies “search.” However, Google’s dominance in that sector is dwindling.

According to eMarketer, Google will lose control of the US search industry for the first time in decades next year.

Google will remain the dominant search player, accounting for 48% of American search advertising revenue. And, remarkably, Google is still increasing its sales in the field, despite being the dominating player in search since the early days of the George W. Bush administration. However, Amazon is growing at a quicker rate.

google

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

Amazon will hold over a quarter of US search ad dollars next year, rising to 27% by 2026, while Google will fall even more, according to eMarketer.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the forecast.

Lest you think you’ll have to switch to Bing or Yahoo, this isn’t the end of Google or anything really near.

Google is the fourth-most valued public firm in the world. Its market worth is $2.1 trillion, trailing just Apple, Microsoft, and the AI chip darling Nvidia. It also maintains its dominance in other industries, such as display advertisements, where it dominates alongside Facebook’s parent firm Meta, and video ads on YouTube.

To put those “other” firms in context, each is worth more than Delta Air Lines’ total market value. So, yeah, Google is not going anywhere.

Nonetheless, Google faces numerous dangers to its operations, particularly from antitrust regulators.

On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Google must open up its Google Play Store to competitors, dealing a significant blow to the firm in its long-running battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games. Google announced that it would appeal the verdict.

In August, a federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on search. That verdict could lead to the dissolution of the company’s search operation. Another antitrust lawsuit filed last month accuses Google of abusing its dominance in the online advertising business.

Meanwhile, European regulators have compelled Google to follow tough new standards, which have resulted in multiple $1 billion-plus fines.

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Pixa Bay

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

On top of that, the marketplace is becoming more difficult on its own.

TikTok, the fastest-growing social network, is expanding into the search market. And Amazon has accomplished something few other digital titans have done to date: it has established a habit.

When you want to buy anything, you usually go to Amazon, not Google. Amazon then buys adverts to push companies’ products to the top of your search results, increasing sales and earning Amazon a greater portion of the revenue. According to eMarketer, it is expected to generate $27.8 billion in search revenue in the United States next year, trailing only Google’s $62.9 billion total.

And then there’s AI, the technology that (supposedly) will change everything.

Why search in stilted language for “kendall jenner why bad bunny breakup” or “police moving violation driver rights no stop sign” when you can just ask OpenAI’s ChatGPT, “What’s going on with Kendall Jenner and Bad Bunny?” in “I need help fighting a moving violation involving a stop sign that wasn’t visible.” Google is working on exactly this technology with its Gemini product, but its success is far from guaranteed, especially with Apple collaborating with OpenAI and other businesses rapidly joining the market.

A Google spokeswoman referred to a blog post from last week in which the company unveiled ads in its AI overviews (the AI-generated text that appears at the top of search results). It’s Google’s way of expressing its ability to profit on a changing marketplace while retaining its business, even as its consumers steadily transition to ask-and-answer AI and away from search.

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Google has long used a single catchphrase to defend itself against opponents who claim it is a monopoly abusing its power: competition is only a click away. Until recently, that seemed comically obtuse. Really? We are going to switch to Bing? Or Duck Duck Go? Give me a break.

But today, it feels more like reality.

Google is in no danger of disappearing. However, every highly dominating company faces some type of reckoning over time. GE, a Dow mainstay for more than a century, was broken up last year and is now a shell of its previous dominance. Sears declared bankruptcy in 2022 and is virtually out of business. US Steel, long the foundation of American manufacturing, is attempting to sell itself to a Japanese corporation.

Could we remember Google in the same way that we remember Yahoo or Ask Jeeves in decades? These next few years could be significant.

SOURCE | CNN

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2024 | Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

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Washington — Trump Media,  The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will not hear an appeal from social media platform X about a search warrant acquired by prosecutors in the election meddling case against former President Donald Trump.

The justices did not explain their rationale, and there were no recorded dissents.

The firm, which was known as Twitter before being purchased by billionaire Elon Musk, claims a nondisclosure order that prevented it from informing Trump about the warrant obtained by special counsel Jack Smith’s team violated its First Amendment rights.

The business also claims Trump should have had an opportunity to exercise executive privilege. If not reined in, the government may employ similar tactics to intercept additional privileged communications, their lawyers contended.

trump

Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

Two neutral electronic privacy groups also joined in, urging the high court to hear the case on First Amendment grounds.

Prosecutors, however, claim that the corporation never shown that Trump utilized the account for official purposes, therefore executive privilege is not a problem. A lower court also determined that informing Trump could have compromised the current probe.

trump

Trump utilized his Twitter account in the weeks preceding up to his supporters’ attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, to spread false assertions about the election, which prosecutors claim were intended to create doubt in the democratic process.

The indictment describes how Trump used his Twitter account to encourage his followers to travel to Washington on Jan. 6, pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to reject the certification, and falsely claiming that the Capitol crowd, which battered police officers and destroyed glass, was peaceful.

musk trump

Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

That case is now moving forward following the Supreme Court’s verdict in July, which granted Trump full immunity from criminal prosecution as a former president.

The warrant arrived at Twitter amid quick changes implemented by Musk, who bought the company in 2022 and has since cut off most of its workforce, including those dedicated to combating disinformation and hate speech.

He also welcomed back a vast list of previously banned users, including Trump, and endorsed him for the 2024 presidential election.

SOURCE | AP

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The Supreme Court Turns Down Biden’s Government Appeal in a Texas Emergency Abortion Matter.

Supreme Court

(VOR News) – A ruling that prohibits emergency abortions that contravene the Supreme Court law in the state of Texas, which has one of the most stringent abortion restrictions in the country, has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States. The United States Supreme Court upheld this decision.

The justices did not provide any specifics regarding the underlying reasons for their decision to uphold an order from a lower court that declared hospitals cannot be legally obligated to administer abortions if doing so would violate the law in the state of Texas.

Institutions are not required to perform abortions, as stipulated in the decree. The common populace did not investigate any opposing viewpoints. The decision was made just weeks before a presidential election that brought abortion to the forefront of the political agenda.

This decision follows the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ended abortion nationwide.

In response to a request from the administration of Vice President Joe Biden to overturn the lower court’s decision, the justices expressed their disapproval.

The government contends that hospitals are obligated to perform abortions in compliance with federal legislation when the health or life of an expectant patient is in an exceedingly precarious condition.

This is the case in regions where the procedure is prohibited. The difficulty hospitals in Texas and other states are experiencing in determining whether or not routine care could be in violation of stringent state laws that prohibit abortion has resulted in an increase in the number of complaints concerning pregnant women who are experiencing medical distress being turned away from emergency rooms.

The administration cited the Supreme Court’s ruling in a case that bore a striking resemblance to the one that was presented to it in Idaho at the beginning of the year. The justices took a limited decision in that case to allow the continuation of emergency abortions without interruption while a lawsuit was still being heard.

In contrast, Texas has been a vocal proponent of the injunction’s continued enforcement. Texas has argued that its circumstances are distinct from those of Idaho, as the state does have an exemption for situations that pose a significant hazard to the health of an expectant patient.

According to the state, the discrepancy is the result of this exemption. The state of Idaho had a provision that safeguarded a woman’s life when the issue was first broached; however, it did not include protection for her health.

Certified medical practitioners are not obligated to wait until a woman’s life is in imminent peril before they are legally permitted to perform an abortion, as determined by the state supreme court.

The state of Texas highlighted this to the Supreme Court.

Nevertheless, medical professionals have criticized the Texas statute as being perilously ambiguous, and a medical board has declined to provide a list of all the disorders that are eligible for an exception. Furthermore, the statute has been criticized for its hazardous ambiguity.

For an extended period, termination of pregnancies has been a standard procedure in medical treatment for individuals who have been experiencing significant issues. It is implemented in this manner to prevent catastrophic outcomes, such as sepsis, organ failure, and other severe scenarios.

Nevertheless, medical professionals and hospitals in Texas and other states with strict abortion laws have noted that it is uncertain whether or not these terminations could be in violation of abortion prohibitions that include the possibility of a prison sentence. This is the case in regions where abortion prohibitions are exceedingly restrictive.

Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which resulted in restrictions on the rights of women to have abortions in several Republican-ruled states, the Texas case was revisited in 2022.

As per the orders that were disclosed by the administration of Vice President Joe Biden, hospitals are still required to provide abortions in cases that are classified as dire emergency.

As stipulated in a piece of health care legislation, the majority of hospitals are obligated to provide medical assistance to patients who are experiencing medical distress. This is in accordance with the law.

The state of Texas maintained that hospitals should not be obligated to provide abortions throughout the litigation, as doing so would violate the state’s constitutional prohibition on abortions. In its January judgment, the 5th United States Circuit Court of Appeals concurred with the state and acknowledged that the administration had exceeded its authority.

SOURCE: AP

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