This map shows population size, city pollution, background pollution, and plume AQI index in cities in every part of the world.
Resource Creator(s)
PlumeLabs’ mission is to make air quality information accessible and empowering. Every year, across every border on this planet, air pollution causes more than 7 million premature deaths. The magnitude of the problem should inspire sweeping change, but it doesn’t. Why? Because like new insights about our climate, the numbers are quick to cause anguish, but get quickly buried by the immediacy of daily life. Every new pollution peak causes new outrage, promptly extinguished into inaction as the news cycle rolls ahead. They care and hope for change, but feel ill-equipped to face a challenge too complex, bigger than us, like it should be a problem for another person or another time. PlumeLabs see an information problem. They see that with the right information at the right time, wisdom can take over panic. And when wisdom has the upper hand, the urgency of the problem can be channeled into imagining solutions rather than endings (Source).
Sustainable World Collaborative’s Analysis
We analyzed each resource in our database based on the Ways of Thinking from the Sustainability Education Framework for Teachers. We select only high-rated resources to include in the database. Below are our ratings and notes for this resource.
Systems Thinking
This resource map has various layers showing population sizes and city population along with how these things could affect one another. Additionally, it shows AQI scores for areas all around the world. This resource could serve as a starting point for looking at why some places air pollution is worse than others. Students will ask – what other systems are causing this air pollution? Are there more systems in a given area that lead to air pollution? Why might this be?
Strategic Thinking
This resource promotes strategic thinking by giving students a tool to evaluate air pollution on a global scale that informs their actions as community members and problem solvers.
Values Thinking
As this resource is a tool, it alone does not provide information on varying perspectives although someone using the tool could help someone begin to wonder if some areas’ values and perspectives air affecting the air pollution for that given area.
Futures Thinking
This resource promotes futures thinking by informing students how people all over the world are contributing to air pollution in real time. If monitored, students will see how air pollution in a given area changes over time. This resource can also provide students a starting point on why they will need to address air pollution for future generations.