No frying tonight for global warming team
Print Edition
WANG Jianqiong has to do without his favorite Chinese dishes, because his job doesn’t allow him to deep-fry his food.
Wang works at the China Global Atmosphere Watch Baseline Observatory at Mount Waliguan in northwest China’s Qinghai Province. It is one of 31 global baseline observatories established by the World Meteorological Organization.
Located 3,816 meters above sea level on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the observatory was built 23 years ago to monitor ozone and greenhouse gases.
The station’s kitchen has a smoke vent that empties out 3 kilometers downhill. “Most of the food is pre-cooked, and we simply heat it,” Wang said.
Frying is banned because that would produce too much smoke, and could affect data collection, Wang said.
“We mainly eat dumplings, rice and noodles,” he said.
Twenty people work at the station. “The station needs at least 10 people to keep an eye on data collection and maintain the equipment. We take turns and change shifts every ten days,” said Ji Jun, a meteorological monitor.
Five of the staff members have been on expeditions to Antarctica.
“Every November to April, the wind at Waliguan is very similar to that of Antarctica. It is extremely difficult to walk against the wind from the living room to the data monitoring equipment,” Ji said.
Every week, the staff collect eight bottles of air, each measuring around 1,800 milliliters, of which two are packaged and sent to the United States. The rest are sent to be studied by the China Meteorological Administration.
“These data mark China’s contribution to the development of atmospheric science. They are the factual basis for the study of how greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide affect global warming,” said Zhang Guoqing, head of the observatory.
In order to take air samples, Wang takes a bottle, places it on the ground, hits a switch and runs away.
“I have to hold my breath. It cannot be drawn into the bottle,” he said.
Besides carbon dioxide, the station monitors levels of ozone, precipitation, and radioactive substances. Every day, more than 60,000 pieces of data are collected.
“We have the best equipment and some of it is quite similar to that used in the Antarctic exploration tours,” Zhang said.
The data is used to map carbon dioxide changes, Zhang said.
“Our curves are almost identical to those made at the Hawaii Mauna Loa observatory of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the United States,” he added.
The site was chosen because of its pristine environment, free from industrial pollution, and within reasonable distance to the provincial capital of Xining, Zhang said.
But the station is faced with an immediate challenge from a smoke tower built by local Tibetan residents, who burn crops here for tribute. “The smoke tower is only 200 meters away and I worry it may affect our data,” he said.
“We need to ensure that the monitoring work remains unaffected and we obtain reliable data, but we also need to consider the religious activities. We have asked the local government for help,” said Zhang.
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