Air Pollution

We live in a world that is surrounded by one of the most amazing things in science, air.

Air is what surrounds our planet that we live on. It is what we breathe so that we don’t die on the

daily. But what happens if that air becomes infected with harsh chemicals and makes us all want

to cringe and cry. Well that would be the creation of air pollution. The world has been terrorized

by air pollution for as long as most of us can remember. As many know air pollution is a

common problem in Utah that needs some work. The laws and actions that cause air pollution

need to be changed to help give us a chance to experience great air without having to give a

second glance.

However, people are saying that the air in Utah is already bad and that we haven’t done

anything about it before why would we do something about it now? But according to an article

done by The Salt Lake Tribune, “Barring an unforeseen breakthrough, one scientist said, it is

likely Utah will miss a critical 2019 federal deadline for meeting those air-quality standards. And

if that happens, it would face legal penalties that could have an economic impact on the Beehive

State”(Penrod). This shows that the laws instate for Utah’s air pollution needs to change so we

can put it some work for the deadline coming in 2019. We have yet to see how the citizens will

be affected but it could be jurassic in many different ways.

Utah has one thing some states don’t have to worry about and that is the inversion. Utah’s

air pollution gets caught up in it and it causes the air to be bad for up to a couple of weeks. That

is why Utah needs to account for that when making the laws and regulations for the air pollution

policies. “State scientists have even modeled scenarios that eliminated all emissions from

industry from the Salt Lake Valley, Call said, and found that 8-9 days into an inversion, the

valley still ends up violating the EPA standards due to emissions from vehicles”(Penrod). This
shows that not only does the government need to focus on industries we also need to focus on

our vehicles as well. With the more cars coming out with cleaner exhaust this should clear up in

the up and coming years.

“According to one study, between 1980 and 2000 the reduction in particle pollution alone

increased life expectancy in fifty-one cities in the United States by an average of five

months”(Allin). This show that by reducing the amount of pollution in the air we can

successfully increase our life expectancy. Everyone wants to live a long and healthy life and if

we can increase the chance of expanding our lives we should take the steps forward. Air

pollution is such a huge environmental risk for everyone especially for the ones with lung

diseases. By decreasing the amount of pollution we can take steps towards healthier lifestyles.

With the pollutants gone we will also have an easier time exercising. Most building we

go in have an elevator for the handicap and for the lazy. Without the pollution we will have

healthier lungs that can get up the stairs. According to an article by the National Institutes of

Health, “Taking the stairs rather than the elevator saved about 15 minutes each workday This,

plus the benefit of increased fitness, should convince hospital staff to take the stairs whenever

possible”(Shah,O’Bryne,and Wilson). The benefit of taking the stairs saves you time a day and

health benefits are beneficial but if only we could make it up the stairs. The pollution causes us

to breath in toxic air which makes are lungs weaker than they would be naturally. By decreasing

the amount of pollution let out into the world we would be able to live healthier lives by going

up the stairs rather than taking the elevator resulting in more time of the day for other activities.

“The United States of America annually produces millions of tons of pollution and

spends tens of billions of dollars per year controlling this pollution”(P2 Act). This shows that the

key reason the United State passes the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990 was to lower the amount
of money we spend on pollution. I agree that we need to find a more affordable way to decreases

the amount of pollution from our society but if the key reason is to decreases the cost does this

mean we still are effectively getting rid of the amount of pollution we need to? The united states

has made several amendments to this act but nothing seems to be changing in the amount of

pollution put out each year. If we can focus primarily on decreases the amount of pollution and

then finding affordable ways to implements those ways than the United States will be golden

when it comes to the discretion of pollution and the financial cost for it.

Some people may say that the we should just rely on cars to get the air cleaner. However

that is not going to work because, “As cars get cleaner, that will go down,” Call said, “but at

some point you get enough new cars from new people that the decline from cars getting cleaner

is going to level out and go back up”(Penrod). This shows that we can’t just rely on the new

technology with cars to help our the air pollution. We need to take a stance and start looking for

new ways to decrease the amount of pollutants put into the air each year. We have to think big

and look at our industries to see what we can do to really stop the pollution from affecting our

everyday lives.

Pollution has a huge affect on everyone’s lives. It causes people to be lazy and use the

elevator instead of the stairs. Even with the cars increasingly getting better there is still a lot of

work that needs to get done. The laws shows the financial benefits but don’t emphasize the what

we need to do to keep the air pollution from increasingly around the world.

Work Cited

https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2018/01/05/utahs-air-pollution-woes-unlikely-to-
clear-up-before-2024-state-scientists-say/
https://www.epa.gov/p2/pollution-prevention-law-and-policies

http://eds.a.ebscohost.com/eds/detail/detail?vid=0&sid=4e087dc0-537e-48e7-be74-
0a232fb8f35b%40sdc-v-
sessmgr02&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU%3d#AN=82558980&db=8gh

https://air.utah.gov/currentconditions.php?id=slc
 Annotated Bibliography

MLA

“Pollution Prevention Law and Policies.” EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, 7 Sept. 2017,

www.epa.gov/p2/pollution-prevention-law-and-policies.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency talks about the laws and standards

put out for pollution. The article talks about the pollution prevention act published in 1990 and

what it is doing to make the environment a safe place. It also goes into detail about other policies

put in place to help decrease the amount of pollution happening.

I can use this information in my paper to show the steps that are being made towards

pollution and what’s working and what isn’t. We can show the steps the United States has made

so far and how we can modify them to help better protect the environment.

MLA

Beard, John. “Winter Temperature Inversions and Emergency Department Visits for Asthma in

Salt Lake County, Utah, 2003-2008.” Environmental Health Perspectives Vol 120, issue 10

2012, p1385-1390. http://eds.b.ebscohost.com/eds/detail/detail?vid=3&sid=1316cb6e-002f-

4b20-b879-

833a6426450d%40sessionmgr104&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU%3d#AN=82558980&d

b=8gh

This article goes over inversion and how it affects the air. It talks about how all the

pollution is built up and it cause the poor air quality. It also talks about the effects it has on

emergency visits related to Asthma in Utah.

 This will help with my paper because it can show me the harmful effects caused by the

pollution in the winter. It also shows how it can affect us in Utah even though the information

was posted a couple of years ago.

MLS

Allin, Craig W. Atmosphere and Air Pollution, Salem Press 2011.

The is an Ebook that goes over the different aspects of air pollution. The book is a

reference that contains selected essays from the Encyclopedia of Environmental Issues. The

essays range from a variety of topics. Each essay was chosen by the editors to make sure it is the

highest quality. In goes into depth about many different environmental factors and the rules

regarding them and air pollution.

This will help my paper succeed because it provides a variety of different information I

can choose from. It has different rules and aspects set in place over the years, which I can

evaluate to see if they are making a difference to the air. The encyclopedia offers over 50

different essays that I can use to gather information. i

 Reflection #1

I decided to write my reflection on the third topic which was writing is a from of action.

Through writing people respond to problems and can create changes in the world. I thought this

was the most applicable thing we learned in our English class this semester. We did this in class

by writing our civically engaged papers. This is us taking a stance on the world trying to make a

change in the topic of choice. My topic was air pollution and what options we have to make the

world a cleaner place. We had the chance to write about an issue in the world and put our voice

out there. We did this also by occasionally talking about current events and what we can do

about those.

We are going to be able to implement this into our daily lives by voting, or making a

statement or starting a petition. There are so many ways to implement writing as our voice in this

world. Look at job applications. They will look at your writing to see if you can help make a

positive difference in their team. Writing in the for on an action is applicable to most the writing

you are going to do in your working life. You need to write when you make a statement for a

claim or when you’re taking out a loan or when using credit to buy a house or a car. Writing as

an action is a key part of our lives especially with social media and how fast things can blow up.

If you write a tweet that is so perfect and well written there’s a high likelihood that it will be seen

by a lot of really important people.

Writing is such a valuable asset to have and knowing how to use it in the form of an

action and to create change in the world is how our society is going to get better and better. Our

society is not going to increase in knowledge or change for the better unless everyone is educated

in the aspects of writing and how it can create change and impact the world for the better.
 Reflection #2

The second key concept I have decided to expand on is the first one, language and

writing are resources people use to do things, be things, and make things in the world. I think this

is a great concept that we had the chance to learn in class.

This applied to us in class when we brainstormed for new ideas. It showed the resources

we had through language to think of new ways to write our thesis’. We also used this when we

used our papers to try to make things in the world. We were trying to make change in some

aspect of our lives. By writing these papers we were given the real opportunity to see how

language and writing are resources in the world.

This applies to our everyday live because without effective language and writing skills

you won’t be able to effectively communicate with the world around you. Look at trump for

examples he uses his written title as president to cause chaos among the United States and

frankly the world. Language can go a long way. We can use language and writing to create new

things or even create a new persona. Look at online dating. All the profiles are written and could

totally be fake. They have the power through writing to change who we are and be a different

person to the people around them. Language and Writing can make you have a lot of power and

if used correctly could help make a lot of helpful impacts on the world around us.