Pittsburgh green story

On March 19’s class, we talked a lot about environment pollution. I think of Pittsburgh – a very good example of environment pollution improvement.

Pittsburgh came to be - and came to be dirty because of location, location, and location. Two navigable rivers met in the middle of a forest, and combined to form a third river. This was an irresistible meeting point for settlement, trade, and industry. It was an added bonus that this meeting point was at the center of the 'Pittsburgh seam' of coal. While the natural advantages of geography and geology initiated development, Pittsburgh's growth soon attracted man-made transportation networks to import resources from its hinterland and spread finished materials through the Midwest. As the city boomed into an industrial metropolis - the Iron City, the Steel City - through the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the smoke only became worse, and Pittsburgh became known, nationally and even internationally, for its dirt, grime, and filth.

Air pollution was a serious problem associated with steel production. Coking leads to large emissions of carbon monoxide and air toxics such as benzene. In October of 1948, a particularly severe stagnation episode occurred.

Donora lies thirty miles south of Pittsburgh, on the Monongahela River. In lasting 4 days twenty people died in Donora, and 7,000 additional individuals were ill. Pittsburgh residents woke up to the severe impact on their city of the smog emanating, which explained the rise of a federal environmental policy in the 1950s and 1960s. The mayor of Pittsburgh, along with the city elite, had begun to identify actions to improve air quality. Actions included reducing the use of bituminous coal as part of a smoke ordinance (Tarr, 1981). Natural gas was piped into homes for heating. Diesel engines began replacing coal-fired engines in locomotives and riverboats.

Today, while steel is still a component of the region’s economy, it is no longer so dominant. Coal continues to play a major role in the region as the primary fuel for producing electricity, and both the coal and electricity are used locally and exported. The rivers are still used for transport, but are not as central in that role. Oil production is virtually gone. Pittsburgh has developed a more diverse economy, in particular by making a push in high-technology areas such as robotics.