Lightning declines over shipping lanes following regulation of sulfur emissions
theconversation.com
Research paper: https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/25/2937/2025/
theconversation.com
Not sure if the crazy lightning was because of sulfur, but I still remember it!
The same electrical potential may still be present in the clouds, but instead of being neutralized dramatically it could now be dissipating slowly rather than gone in a flash :)
More study would be good to have.
I expect it's related to how lightning is triggered, not changes in atmospheric charge due to conductivity.
Problem is, atmospheric science isn't exactly considered "high status" vs the other two.
That was my initial thought, like a “phantom power” drain, the process by which electrons knock each other is able to happen in a broad manner, not concentrated in the poles and suddenly discharging among a single path, i.e., lightning.
It seems similar to how static electricity builds up easier in dry environments because in humid ones the electrons can more easily equalize across water molecules.
I wouldn't jump to this lemma so quickly. The paper mentions the density of aerosols. Sulfur oxides promote condensation by forming low-volatility compounds like H2SO3 and H2SO4. An increase in the number density of droplets could mean more triboelectric charge transfer between the droplets and the air. That would increase the amount of electric energy in the clouds.
This is also the mechanism by which sulfur has been proposed for geoengineering, but I think the variant that replaces sulfur with terpenes sounds safer.
Sadly misunderstood by a bunch of people.
Wait, that explains why volcanoes always have a cloud full of lightnings too, when they erupt.
I think there is only one spot in the planet that gets enough regular lightning to maybe be worth something (a random place in Venezuela, oddly), otherwise it isn’t worth the Capital.
The correct reply was: “Yes. Via that lens it makes me wonder if there are not other similar catalysts that we’ve been missing.”
Sorry mate. Small ideas from small minds don’t excite me. Have a nice day.
I would expect a shipping lane to have more or less than baseline amounts of lightening regardless of soot on the basis of it being generally more churned up and therefore having slightly different potential than the rest of the ground (which just happens to be liquid water in this case).
It's not clear to me if the study is isolating the variable they're measuring properly.
Surely there's a "control" shipping lane somewhere that was cleaner to begin with or never cleaned up.
Additionally, it's well known that having a bunch of crap (including water) suspended in the air to bridge the gaps makes it easier for electricity to arc so it's not clear if and/or to what extent this the change a result of sulfer emissions or particulate generally.
It's also well known that particulate facilitates condensation (the article talks about this).
Isn't the shipping lane the "treatment" group and everywhere else in the world the "control" group?
Like we administered x mg of sulfer to the patient and they saw y outcome while patients not receiving sufler saw z outcome. When we stopped administering sulfer all patients saw z outcome seems to be isolating sulfer as causing y.
There is a reason we use placebos for control groups.
For example, covid just uses a treatment group and considers the rest of the world as control.
> Surely there's a "control" shipping lane somewhere that was cleaner to begin with or never cleaned up.
As mentioned in the first paragraph of the article they are using the Global Lightning Detection Network, which is well, global. Then you just need a map of SO2 concentration and compare shipping lanes against non-shipping lanes. You don't need an explicit control group if your data includes the whole planet, since you can just compare shipping lanes against similar areas with less/no shipping. Since both lightning and SO2 also varies over time you can also correlate this way with enough data.