air pollution

Olawunmi Olawale
Quinton Blackwell
Engl093
11 Nov 20014
Air pollution effect on humans
There's nothing quite like opening the door and breathing fresh, clean, air—but how clean is the air you're breathing right now? Unless you're a scientist with a chemistry lab at your fingertips, there's no real way of knowing. The gases you're sucking up through your nose could be slowly killing you: according to the World Health Organization, around two million people die prematurely from the effects of polluted air every single year. Air pollution has both acute and chronic effects on human health, affecting a number of different systems and organs. It ranges from minor upper respiratory irritation to chronic respiratory and heart disease, lung cancer, acute respiratory infections in children and chronic bronchitis in adults, aggravating pre-existing heart and lung disease, or asthmatic attacks. ‘‘It causes damage by altering the earth’s atmosphere” an article published by (united states new). What exactly causes this major environmental issue and what can we do about it? Let's take a closer look! Air pollution is a gas or a liquid or solid dispersed through ordinary air released in a big enough quantity to harm the health of people or other animals, kill plants or stop them growing properly, damage or disrupt some other aspect of the environment, or cause some other kind of nuisance. When pollution occurs in the air, it can easily travel and spread, and because we breathe in air, we cannot easily avoid it. When we think of pollution, we tend to think it's a problem that humans cause through ignorance or stupidity and that's certainly true some of the time. There are several ways in which pollution occur. The natural sources are Forest fires, erupting volcanoes, and gases released from radioactive decay of rocks inside Earth are just three examples of natural air pollution that can have hugely disruptive effects on people and the planet. Forest fires produce huge swathes of smoke that drift for miles over neighboring cities, countries, or continents. Giant volcanic eruptions can spew so much dust into the atmosphere that they block out significant amounts of sunlight and cause the entire planet to cool down for a year or more. Radioactive rocks can release a gas called radon when they decay, which can build up in the basements of buildings with serious effects on people's health. The human sources of polluting the air are, burning Fossil Fuels through human mean of transportation which is a key part of our lives. Cars, and heavy duty trucks, trains, shipping vessels and airplanes all burn lots of fossil fuels to work. ‘‘The missions from automobile engines contain both primary and secondary pollutant which is a major cause of pollution, and one that is very difficult to manage’’(Environmental pollution 270). This is because humans rely heavily on vehicles and engines for transporting people, good and services. Fumes from car exhaust contain dangerous gases such as carbon monoxide, oxides of nitrogen, hydrocarbons and particulates. On their own, they cause great harm to people who breathe them. Additionally, they react with environmental gases to create further toxic gases (lifescript health new). Another ways in which human pollute the air is through household and farming chemicals such as crop dusting, fumigating homes, household cleaning products or painting supplies, over the counter insect/pest killers, fertilizer, dust emit harmful chemicals into the air and cause pollution. In many case, when we use these chemicals at home or offices with no or little ventilation, we may fall ill if we breathe them. The industrial source are caused by smoke emitted from factory which contaminates many sources of drinking water, released unwanted toxins into the air and reduces the quality of soil all over the world. Major environmental disasters have been caused due to industrial mishaps, which have yet to be brought under control.
Air pollution can harm the health of humans and animals, damage crops or stop them growing properly, and make our world unpleasant and unattractive in a variety of other ways. According to ‘‘explainthatstuff’’ state a notable incident that happened in London and England in 1952 when thick, deadly pollution known as the Great Smog that was caused by people burning coal in home fires and coal-fired power plants killed an estimated 4000 people. Scientists have known for decades that particulate matter and ozone, along with other air pollutants, are associated with acute and chronic health problems, including premature death, lung cancer, and exacerbation of respiratory and cardiovascular disease, lung inflammation, asthma, bronchitis, and increased risk for cardiovascular death. ‘‘National resources defense council’’ (NRDC) also stated that in 2010, the American Lung Association estimated that about 23 million Americans suffered from asthma through air pollution. Air pollution is one of the world's biggest killers that cause around two million people to die prematurely each year. Many of these deaths happen in developing countries (over half a million in India alone), but wealthier industrial nations suffer too: in the United States, for example, around 41,000 people a year are estimated to die early because of air pollution. Air pollution can also cause birth defect when exposed in first two month of pregnancy. ‘‘Well’’ stated that mother living in areas with the highest levels of carbon monoxide or nitrogen oxide concentrations (the top 25 percent) was almost twice as likely to give birth to a child with neural tube defects severe and often fatal defects of the brain and spinal cord— as one living in areas with the lowest concentrations.
Air pollution can happen on every scale, from the local to the global. Sometimes the effects are immediate and happen very near to the thing that caused them; but they can also happen days, months, or even years later and in other cities, countries, or continents. Sitting in an area where a nail is been polish ‘Acetone’ (a solvent in nail varnish remover) is a VOC (volatile organic compound), so it evaporates and spreads very quickly, rapidly getting up the nose of anyone sitting nearby. Open a can of gloss paint in home and start painting a door or window and paint contain noxious chemical stench VOCs again! Grill some toast too long and you'll set the bread on fire, filling kitchen with clouds of soot and possibly setting off a smoke alarm or carbon monoxide detector. These are three everyday examples of how air pollution can work on a very local scale. Indoor pollution is when air is been suck in the house because people thinks their house is the cleanest place and doesn’t allow continuous movement of air that outside air are polluted. Outside, though the air may seem polluted, it's constantly moving and pollutants are continually being diluted and dispersed. Inside, our home is packed with all kinds of chemicals such as detergent, shoes polish, shower curtain, hair spray, air conditioner and others that generate pollution every time we use them. And, unless windows are open regularly, those pollutants aren't going anywhere fast. Neighborhood air pollution depends on how clean is the air on where you live: air is generally far cleaner in rural than in urban areas, for example, where factories, chemical plants, and power plants are more likely to be located and traffic levels are much higher. Exactly how clean the neighborhood is can also depend critically on the weather, especially if live somewhere prone to temperature inversions and smog ‘‘National geographic’’. Neighborhood air pollution problems are often best tackled through local community campaigns.
Solution efforts on pollution are always a big problem. This is why prevention interventions are always a better way of controlling air pollution. These prevention methods can either come from government (laws) or by individual actions. In many big cities, monitoring equipment has been installed at many points in the city. Authorities read them regularly to check the quality of air. Let's see more below:
Technological solutions Technology has caused part of air pollution problem, so it can provide solutions. Cars with conventional gasoline engines are now routinely fitted with catalytic converters that remove some of the pollutants from the exhaust gases. Power plants are fitted with electrostatic smoke precipitators that use static electricity to pull dirt and soot from the gases that drift up smokestacks; in time, it's likely that many older power plants will also be retro-fitted with carbon capture systems that trap carbon dioxide to help reduce global warming. On a much smaller scale, environmentally friendly people who want to ventilate their homes without opening windows and wasting energy can install heat-recovery ventilation systems, which use the heat energy locked in outgoing waste air to warm fresh incoming air. Technologies like this can help us live smarter to go about our lives in much the same way with far less impact on the planet.
Individual prevention
Encourage your family to use the bus, train or bike when commuting. If we all do this, there will be fewer cars on road and less fumes. Use energy (light, water, boiler, kettle and fire woods) wisely. This is because lots of fossil fuels are burned to generate electricity, and so if we can cut down the use, we will also cut down the amount of pollution we create. Recycle and re-use things. This will minimize the dependence of producing new things. Remember manufacturing industries create a lot of pollution, so if we can re-use things like shopping plastic bags, clothing, paper and bottles, it can help.
Laws and regulations
By itself, technology is as likely to harm the environment as to help it. That's why laws and regulations have been such an important part of tackling the problem of pollution. Many once-polluted cities now have relatively clean air and water, largely thanks to anti-pollution laws introduced during the mid-20th century. ‘‘Explainthatstuff’’, In England, following the 1952 smog tragedy that killed thousands of people in the city of London, the government introduced its Clean Air Act of 1956, which restricted how and where coal could be burned and where furnaces could be sited and forced people to build smokestacks higher to disperse pollution. In the United States, a series of Clean Air Acts were passed between the 1960s and 1990s. The 1990 Pollution Prevention Act went even further, shifting the emphasis from cleaning up pollution to preventing it ever happening in the first place. National laws are of little help in tackling trans-boundary pollution but that doesn't mean the law is useless in such cases. The creation of the European Union has led to many Europe-wide environmental acts, called directives. These force the member countries to introduce their own, broadly similar, national environmental laws that ultimately cover the entire European region. For example, the 1976 European Bathing Water Directive tried to enforce minimum standards of water quality for beaches and coastal areas across Europe to reduce pollution from sewage disposal, while the 1996 European Directive on Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) attempted to limit air and water pollution from industry. ‘‘explainthatstuff’’
Conclusion
Polluted substance is introduced to the air through different ways and this is causing lot of serious health problem to human, plant and animal. It also shortens people life if urgent care is not taken. The best to prevent this is working together to reduce pollution so that the future generations can live in a healthy, unpolluted environment. As the saying goes, precaution is better than cure. Let’s hands on hands together by recycle and conserve the world for the better future.
Worked cited
Stefano Loppi and Stergios Arg. Pirintsos . Environmental pollution pp. 275, 2008
BBC new, united state
Lifescript. 28 October 2014.health effect of pollution. 28 October 2014 <http:// www.lifesrciptnew.comChris Woodford. 14 September 2014. Air pollution 10 October 2014 <http:// www.explainthatstuff.com/air-pollution-introduction.html
National geographic. 11 September 2008. Air Pollution Comes From Many Sources 10 October 2014 <http:// www.nationalgeographic.com NICHOLAS BAKALAR. 8 April 2013. Air Pollution Tied to Birth Defects 18 October 2014 <http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/air-pollution-tied-to-birth-defects/?_r=0
Natural Resources Defense Council. 6 June 2014. Cleaner and Cheaper: Using the Clean Air Act to Sharply Reduce Carbon Pollution from Existing Power Plants. 18 October 2014<http://www.nrdc.org/air/pollution-standards/default.asp