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1 INTRODUCTION 3
6 CONTROLLING MEASURES 24
7 CONCLUSION 25
INTRODUCTION
Water
Water is the resource that covers almost three-quarters of the planet,
and upon which all life depends. Throughout the history of the natural
world, water sources have been the centers of life, providing habitat
and sustenance for animals and plants alike.
Water Pollution
The simplest definition of water pollution is "the loss of any of the
actual or potential beneficial uses of water caused by any change in its
composition due to human activity". The beneficial uses of water are
varied and include its use for drinking and for domestic purposes, for
watering livestock and the irrigation of crops, for fisheries - both game
[salmonid] and coarse [cyprinid], for industry and for food production,
for bathing and for recreational and amenity use.
Causes
There are many specific causes of water pollution, but before we list
the toppers, it's important to understand two broad categories of water
pollution .
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Fertilizers
Oil spills like the Exxon Valdez spill off the coast of Alaska or the more
recent Prestige spill off the coast of Spain get lots of news coverage,
and indeed they do cause major water pollution and problems for local
wildlife, fishermen, and coastal businesses. But the problem of oil
polluting water goes far beyond catastrophic oil spills. Land-based
petroleum pollution is carried into waterways by rainwater runoff. This
includes drips of oil, fuel, and fluid from cars and trucks; dribbles of
gasoline spilled onto the ground at the filling station; and drips from
industrial machinery. These sources and more combine to provide a
continual feed of petroleum pollution to all of the world's waters,
imparting an amount of oil to the oceans every year that is more than
5 times greater than the Valdez spill.
Mining
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• The mining process exposes heavy metals and sulfur compounds
that were previously locked away in the earth. Rainwater leaches
these compounds out of the exposed earth, resulting in "acid
mine drainage" and heavy metal pollution that can continue long
after the mining operations have ceased.
• Similarly, the action of rainwater on piles of mining waste
(tailings) transfers pollution to freshwater supplies.
• In the case of gold mining, cyanide is intentionally poured on
piles of mined rock (a leach heap) to chemically extract the gold
from the ore. Some of the cyanide ultimately finds its way into
nearby water.
Sediment
When forests are "clear cut," the root systems that previously held soil
in place die and sediment is free to run off into nearby streams, rivers,
and lakes. Thus, not only does clearcutting have serious effects on
plant and animal biodiversity in the forest, the increased amount of
sediment running off the land into nearby bodies of water seriously
affects fish and other aquatic life. Poor farming practices that leave soil
exposed to the elements also contribute to sediment pollution in water.
Almost all bodies of water in the world have some level of pollution
from chemicals and industrial waste.
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In the United States, 34 billion liters per year (60%) of the most
hazardous liquid waste—solvents, heavy metals, and radioactive
materials—is injected directly into deep groundwater via thousands of
"injection wells." Although the EPA requires that these effluents be
injected below the deepest source of drinking water, some pollutants
have already entered underground water supplies in Florida, Texas,
Ohio, and Oklahoma.
Plastic
Sea creatures that are killed by plastic readily decompose. The plastic
does not—it remains in the ecosystem to kill again and again.
Sewage
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In developing countries, an estimated 90% of wastewater is discharged
directly into rivers and streams without treatment. Even in modern
countries, untreated sewage, poorly treated sewage, or overflow from
under-capacity sewage treatment facilities can send disease-bearing
water into rivers and oceans. In the US, 850 billion gallons of raw
sewage are sent into US rivers, lakes, and bays every year by leaking
sewer systems and inadequate combined sewer/storm systems that
overflow during heavy rains. Leaking septic tanks and other sources of
sewage can cause groundwater and stream contamination.
Beaches also suffer the effects of water pollution from sewage. The
chart below shows the typical reasons that about 25% of the beaches
in the US are put under water pollution advisories or are closed each
year. It's clear that sewage is part of the problem, even in what is
supposedly the most advanced country in the world.
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negative effect on the fish and other aquatic life. Fish kills and an
invasion and growth of certain types of weeds can cause dramatic
changes in a stream or other body of water. Energy is derived from the
oxidation process. BOD specifies the strength of sewage. In sewage
treatment, to say that the BOD has been reduced from 500 to 50
indicates that there has been a 90 percent reduction.
• Nutrient pollution
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ultimately working their way up to seabirds, marine mammals, and
humans. The result can be illness and sometimes death.
• Chemical contamination
Over the years, many types of chemicals have gotten into our
waterways—and they continue to do so today. Chemical water
pollution typically occurs because ...
The effect of every chemical that has ever polluted water, but it's easy
enough to point out a few things:
Severe chemical spills and leaks into surfaces waters usually have
an immediate effect on aquatic life (fish kills, etc.).
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The human effects of chemical pollution in water can generally be
viewed the same as any other form of chemical contamination—water
is just the delivery mechanism.
Pesticides
Pesticides can migrate via water into the food chain as well,
ultimately being consumed by humans or animals in food.
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(and other animals) that ate the fish. DDE, the principal breakdown
product of DDT, built up in the fatty tissues of female eagles and
prevented sufficient calcium being released to produce strong egg
shells. The thin shells would break when the parents sat on the eggs to
keep them warm. DDT affected many other species as well. In
terms of general human health effects, pesticides can ...
• Scientists know that oil (or chemical components of oil) can seep
into marsh and sub-tidal sediments and lurk there for decades,
negatively affecting marsh grasses, marine worms, and other
aquatic life forms that live in, on, or near the sediment.
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PCBs, dioxins, DDT, and a number of other persistent organic
pollutants don't readily break down in the environment and tend to
collect in the fatty tissues of animals. All of these chemicals are toxic
for the animals that harbor them. In cases where humans might eat,
say, a PCB-contaminated farmed salmon, their systems must deal with
the chemical insult.
• Deformed fish and other aquatic life have been found near
Swedish pulp mills that use chlorine as a bleaching agent—a
practice that results in discharges of dioxins and other highly
toxic substances.
Other Chemicals
Mining
When rain or surface water flows over exposed rock and soil, it can
combine with naturally occurring sulfur to form sulfuric acid. The
acidified rainwater eventually finds its way to streams and
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groundwater, polluting them and impacting local aquatic life. Some
streams can become so acidic—more acidic than car-battery acid—the
aquatic ecosystem is completely destroyed. The same leaching
process that causes acid mine drainage can impart heavy-metal
pollutants from the soil and rock as well.
In this technique, the tops of coal-rich mountains are removed and the
overburden is dumped into nearby valleys, burying stream habitats
altogether, with the obvious catastrophic effect on whatever life forms
lived in or around the stream.
• Marine debris
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drowning or amputation. Marine debris can also degrade coral reefs,
sea grass beds, and other aquatic habitats.
Thermal pollution
It's easy enough to see how discharging the heated-up water from a
power plant into a river could cause problems for aquatic organisms
used to having their water home stay at a fairly specific temperature.
Indeed, industrial thermal pollution is a problem for our waterways—
fish and other organisms adapted to a particular temperature range
can be killed from thermal shock, and the extra heat may disrupt
spawning or kill young fish.
Noise pollution
"Noise pollution" from ship engines and sonar systems make it difficult
for marine mammals like whales, dolphins, and porpoises to
communicate, find food, and avoid hazards. Powerful sonar systems
operating at certain frequencies have been implicated in whale
beachings and may cause damage to marine mammals' sound-
sensitive internal structures, causing internal bleeding and even death.
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Frequent or chronic exposure to both high- and low-intensity sounds
may cause stress on all higher forms of marine life, potentially
affecting growth, reproduction, and ability to resist disease.
You can find out how to have a nice lawn, stop wasting money on lawn
chemicals, and stop polluting our waterways by checking out these two
articles: lawn care tips and organic lawn care.
Both inland and coastal wetlands act to buffer surges in runoff and to
filter pollutants from runoff and flows. Yet it has been standard practice
in the US (and many other countries) to allow development concerns to
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almost always trump the value of "nature's services." It's time to get
serious about preserving wetlands.
• Drive less...
If the toilet in your house were spewing its contents onto your
bathroom floor, you would make it a very high priority to get the
situation corrected. As societies, we should place the same priority on
upgrading out-of-date or under-capacity sewage treatment plants that
sometimes spew their contents into our waterways. It's also important
to ensure that homeowners with septic fields are installing and
maintaining their systems in a way that does not contaminate nearby
groundwater or surface water.
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• Help localities set up programs that ensure septic system
maintenance and monitoring. A lot of rural homeowners
seem to think that a septic system is a magical place where No.
1's and 2's go, never to be heard from again. Nope. Septic
systems are bio-mechanical devices that need occasional
attention; otherwise, they begin to fail and send poo-goo into
streams and groundwater. A great way to help keep your septic
field in good shape is to occasionally add Flow, a biologically
active formula that helps break things down.
• Eliminate "straight pipes." In some areas, even in the US, a
few people still run the outflow pipe from their house's plumping
system straight to the nearest creek. These illegal setups need to
be corrected.
• Fully fund beach monitoring programs so that people will
stay out of the water when it's not safe. (OK, we know that's not
really a water pollution solution, but it's worth doing until sewage
problems are truly solved.)
• Conserve water which helps reduce loads on septic systems
and treatment plants, reducing the likelihood that they will send
waste into our waters.
One thing that works well to help control backyard and neighborhood
pollution is to implement urban and suburban storm water
management strategies, including:
Stopping Deforestation
A healthy forest acts like a sponge to soak up the rains when they
come, holding the water and filtering it before it makes its way to
nearby streams, lakes, and rivers. When all the trees are cut down—
clearcutting is still logging companies' preferred method of operation—
the forest ecosystem dies and can no longer perform this service. Rain
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water rushes directly into streams, flowing over exposed soil, picking
up and carrying sediment pollution into nearby waterways.
While it's true that a large amount of oil naturally seeps into the ocean
from underground geological sources, marine life in the areas where
this occurs have had eons to adapt to the conditions. Human-caused
petroleum pollution invariably happens in much more sensitive areas,
often with disastrous consequences.
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• Drive your vehicle less. That will mean your vehicle is putting
less petroleum pollution into our waters (not to mention less air
pollution into our air).
• Maintain your vehicle more. If you see oil stains on your
driveway, your car needs attention.
• If you must own a motorized boat or jet ski, keep it well
maintained.
• We hope it goes without saying, but if you change your oil
yourself, don't dump the used oil down the nearest sewer drain!
In many places, local service stations are required by law to
accept your used oil. Alternatively, most municipal recycling
centers accept used motor oil.
First, there are some things we should expect from our government
and corporations:
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There are also some water pollution solutions we as consumers and
citizens can implement when it comes to chemicals:
In terms of water pollution, there are two main threats from global
warming:
There are plenty more ways in which global warming will impact water;
for instance, less mountain snow pack and smaller glaciers will result in
lower river flows for many regions during summer, and melting ice
sheets in Greenland and Antarctica will change salinity levels and
ocean flows, and will raise ocean levels, inundating coastal properties
and ecosystems.
CONTROLLING MEASURES
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• Dispose of garbage in a bin or by composting.
• Never wash animal wastes into trenches.
• Never wash pesticides into trenches.
• Use fertilizers in minimum quantities and avoid applying
fertilizers when it is raining.
• Breaking water mains is an offence and endangers the health
of people as polluted water can easily enter the potable water
supply system .This would prevent the likelihood of flooding
and of mosquitoes breeding.
• Quickly fixing leaks on cars reduces the chance of polluting oil
and petrol getting into water ways.
CONCLUSION
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must learn that energy use can be dramatically diminished
without sacrificing comfort.
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