--- description: Trees are the smartest investment to clean urban air, ‘good’ cholesterol could be a myth and more. title: Trees Are The Smartest Investment to Clean Urban Air image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [Ideas](/section/ideas/) ## Ideas Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [Innovation](/tag/innovation/) ## Innovation Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Trees Are The Smartest Investment to Clean Urban Air by [The Aspen Institute](/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Nov 3, 2016 4:00 PM CUT by [The Aspen Institute](/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Nov 3, 2016 4:00 PM CUT **1\.** [**The smartest investment to clean urban air: trees.**](https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/tree-planting-urban-health-gains-by-pascal-mittermaier-2016-11 "undefined") By Pascal Mittermaier in Project Syndicate **2\.** [**‘Good’ cholesterol could be a myth.**](https://www.statnews.com/2016/10/31/hdl-cholesterol/?s%5Fcampaign=stat%3Arss "undefined") By Damian Garde in STAT **3\.** [**The future of batteries — long lasting and safe — might be found in a junkyard.**](https://news.vanderbilt.edu/2016/11/02/making-high-performance-batteries-from-junkyard-scraps/ "undefined") By David Salisbury at Vanderbilt University **4\.** [**Want your kids to learn how to make hard decisions? Let them lose sometimes.**](https://www.amherst.edu/news/news%5Freleases/2016/-new-page-/let-them-lose "undefined") By Caroline Hanna at Amherst College **5\.** [**Technology is everywhere in schools — except in how we design them.**](http://qz.com/811798/school-designs-need-to-be-modernized-to-keep-up-with-technological-innovations-in-education/ "undefined") By Danish Kurani in Quartz  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/ "undefined") _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4556286/trees-are-the-smartest-investment-to-clean-urban-air/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4556286/trees-are-the-smartest-investment-to-clean-urban-air/"},"headline":"Trees Are The Smartest Investment to Clean Urban Air","datePublished":"2016-11-03T16:00:45.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:59:22.226Z","description":"These are today's best ideas","url":"https://time.com/4556286/trees-are-the-smartest-investment-to-clean-urban-air/","keywords":["Innovation","Parenting","Environment","Education","health","Batteries"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/innovation/","name":"Innovation"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4556286/trees-are-the-smartest-investment-to-clean-urban-air/","name":"Trees Are The Smartest Investment to Clean Urban Air"}}]}] ```