Air Pollution

     Air pollution is not a new topic.  The phrase "I'll go out for a breath of fresh air." is often heard. But how many of us realize that this has become insigneificant  in today’s world, because the quality of air in our cities is anything but fresh. The second you step out of your house and are on the road you can see the air getting polluted. A cloud of smoke from the exhaust of a bus, car, or a motorcycle. Smoke shooting from a factory chimney. Flyash generated by thermal power plants. Zipping cars causing dust to rise from the roads. But what is air pollution?

    

     "What is air polluition?" is the kind of question that isn't normally asked because most of us think we already know the awnser. But what we think can sometimes end up being completly wrong. The definition of air pollution is a little more complicated then you think. Smog, smoke and soot are the most common partners of air pollution. They are either the result of air pollution or the cause of it. For those of you that don't know what smog or soot is, smog is a grayish, yellowish cloud caused by the reaction between sunlight, heat and air pollutants. It is the most visible form of air pollution. Smog is what floats over urban cities like New York, Los Veges, and Beijing. Soot is a black powdery substance consisting mostly unstructured carbon, produced by the incomplete burning of organic matter. It's the  black powder that forms when you burn wood. But air pollution comes in many different forms and I think all of these forms are bad for you. How? Air pollution has a big effect your health and on the environment. Every year, about 2.5 million people die, around the world, because of air pollution, and countless plants and animals lives end due to the air pollution in there environments.

     

     Air pollution can be both natural and man-made. As you may know, humans have been producing increasing amounts of air pollution as time has passed, and are now the cause of the majority of the pollutants released into the air. Air pollutants mostly come from discharges of gases and particals largely from industries, motor vehicals, and domestic wood burning. Natural sources include wind blown dust and smoke from bush fires. Among the many types of air pollutants there are carbon minoxid, variable organic compounds that can evaporate and enter the Earth's atmousphere, ozone, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, particals, and lead. Air pollution can cause health problems. Smog can worsen existing respiratory ailments such as asthma and bronchitis, or increase the risk of respiratory problems. Every day, an average person breaths in about 20,000 liters of air and risks inhaling dangerous chemicals that have found a way into the air. Air pollution is bad for the environment because it  causes insecurity, disorder, harm or discomfort to living organisms and ecosystems.

     Air pollution has many causes. There are numerous different chemical substances that contribute to air pollution. These chemicals come from a variety of sources.  Forest fires, volcanic eruptions, wind erosion, pollen dispersal, evaporation of organic compounds, and natural radioactivity are some more natural causes of air pollution. Natural air pollution does not stay in one location. It spreads around throughout the world, and because of this poses little threat to the health of humans and to ecosystems. Most of the pollution is through human activity. The largest causes are the operation of fossil fuel-burning power plants and automobiles that combust fuel. Combined, these two sources are responsible for about 90% of all air pollution in the United States. Some cities suffer brutally because of massive industrial use of chemicals that cause air pollution. Places like Mexico City and Sao Paulo have some of the most deadly pollution levels in the world. Air pollution also has many effects. For one, air pollution is responsible for major health effects. Every day, the health of tons of peoples is ruined or endangered by air pollution. Chemicals that somehow have gotten into the air can effect the human body in negitive ways. Older people are higly exposed to diseases induced by air pollution. Children, infants and people with heart and lung disease are also at serious risk.Because people are induced to many dangerous pollutants, it's difficult to know which is responsible for causing sickness. Also, a mixture of different pollutants can deepen sickness, it is hard to isolate these pollutants that are at fault. many diseases could be caused with out their becoming apparent for a long time. Pollutants such as ozone, nitrogen oxide, and sulfur dioxide have very harmful effects of natural ecosystems. They kill plants and trees by destroying their leaves, and they kill animals, especially fish in highly polluted rivers.

Effects, Sources, Transport/Transformation and Removal of Air Pollution

     Preventing the problem before it occurs or limiting the effect of the process is one of the 2 main types of pollution control. This type is called Input control. Five major input control methods are to:

1. Restrict population growth.
2. Use less energy.
3. Improve energy efficiency.
4. Reduce waste.
5. Move to non-renewable forms of energy production.

Automobile-producted pollution can also be lowered with highy benificial results. The secound type of pollution control is called Output control which uses a totally opposite method. Output control seeks out to fix the problems caused by air pollution. This generally means cleaning up an area that has been damaged by air pollution. Input control is usually for useful the output control. Output control is also more expencive making them less desirable to tax payers and polluting industries.


     Air pollution is a huge problem in today's world. Whether it's from someone smoking a cigarette or a rush hour traffic jam. Everybody should know that its our duty, as human beings, to clean the Earth. If everyone starts doing little thing to keep the air and the environment clean like picking up litter or using as less perfume or hair spray as possible, you will see that in time,  Earth and the air will start getting cleaner on its own.



Refrences: http://library.thinkquest.org, http://www.epa.vic.gov.au, http://environment.about.com, http://edugreen.teri.res.in, http://wiki.answers.com

Greenhouse Gases

     Have you ever been inside a greenhouse on a cold winter day? It may be cold outside, but inside beautiful green plants are growing in the warmth and sunshine. Greenhouses are made of glass and are designed to hold heat inside. Our planet's atmosphere captures energy just like a greenhouse. Energy from the Sun can enter the Earth’s atmosphere, but not all of it can easily find its way out again. What blocks the Sun’s energy from escaping from the Earth? Unlike a greenhouse, the Earth does not have a layer of glass over it! Instead, molecules in our atmosphere called greenhouse gases absorb the heat. Greenhouse gases include water vapor (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and chlorofluorocarbons (CFS).

     We all know what water vapor is but what does it do? It acts as a feedback to the climate. Water vapor increases as the Earth's atmosphere warms, but so does the possibility of clouds and precipitation, making these some of the most important feedback mechanisms to the greenhouse effect. Carbon dioxide -or CO2- is a minor but very important component of the atmosphere, CO2 is released through natural processes such as respiration, volcano eruptions and through human activities such as deforestation, land use changes, and burning fossil fuels.  Methane is a hydrocarbon gas produced both through natural sources and human activities, including the decomposition of wastes in landfills, agriculture, and especially rice cultivation, as well as ruminant digestion and manure management associated with domestic livestock. On a molecule-for-molecule basis, methane is a far more active greenhouse gas than CO2, but also one which is much less liberal in the atmosphere. Nitrous oxide is a powerful greenhouse gas produced by soil cultivation practices, especially the use of commercial and organic fertilizers, fossil fuel combustion, nitric acid production, and biomass burning. Chlorofluorocarbons are synthetic compounds entirely of industrial origin used in a number of applications, but now largely regulated in production and release to the atmosphere by international agreement for their ability to contribute to destruction of the ozone layer. There may not be much of some of these gases in our atmosphere, but they can have a big impact. Each greenhouse gas molecule is made of three or more atoms that are bonded loosely together. These molecules are able to absorb heat, which makes them vibrate. They eventually release the heat energy and it is often absorbed by another greenhouse gas molecule.

                         
     I always thought greenhouse gases were bad for the Earth and everything on it but it turns out that without them the Earth would be completely frozen! We would be human icicles! But that doesn't mean they aren't harmful. Too much greenhouse gases are bad, because they create global warming. If there are too much greenhouse gases in the air then too much heat will be trapped on earth and can't escape to space causing melting ice caps and glaciers and floods. If that happened then in a few years islands would be completely underwater, and a lot of cities would be flooded. This might happen if we don't stop adding more greenhouse gases to our atmosphere, and causing a repidly inceasing greenhouse effect. The increased greenhouse effect is causing changes in our planet that can affect our lives.

     What can we do to stop this? I think there are tons of thing we can do to stop or at least decrease greenhouse gases but we aren't trying to. Tuning off unnecessary light can have a big effect to the environment. Half the time people aren't even using the lights. Use less electricity. On a winter day, turn off your fridge and put all of your food outside (just kidding...maybe). Save energy. Don't drive your car or use transit to go places where you can walk or bike to. Don't litter. It only takes about a minuet for you to walk over to the trash can, open it and throws something away. Recycle! Did you know that most of what you recycle is remade into paper or pop cans with twice as less energy and electricity as it did to make a brand new pop can or paper. People who smoke are also a big part of increasing greenhouse gases. They don't know that cigarettes contain over 4000 chemicals that are released into the air and cigarette butts that are tossed end up in lakes and oceans, most of the time, and are later turned into the water we drink. One thing that would really help earth is if we destroy all humans except for the nature loving ones. But then there wouldn't be many humans on Earth, would there?

     My point for this post before I started writing it was that greenhouse gases are bad but after doing a lot of research I don't think that anymore. Sure, they can be bad but only when there is a lot of it. Greenhouse gases can sometimes be bad and sometimes be good. There are some things we need from it and some things we don’t. All we have to do is find a way to block out the bad part. Until that happens, I hope we continue to help not pollute and ruin the atmosphere.

References: http://www.nasa.com/, http://www.wikiawnsers.com/, http://www.yahoo.com/, http://www.google.com/, Mr.C.