AIR POLLUTION

    Air pollution can be defined as the presence of toxic chemicals or compounds -including those of biological origin- in the air, at sea levels that pose a health risk. In an even broader sense, air pollution means the presence of chemicals or compounds in the air which are usually not present and which lower the quality of the air or cause detrimental changes to the quality of life such as the damaging of the ozone layer or causing global warming.

    Indeed, air pollution is one of the biggest problem and threat to our world because it isn’t just air pollution, it is also climate change, increase at the temperature and greenhouse effect. This means that just by polluting the air we are not only damaging the air, we also trigger many other huge environmental problems all over the world. Moreover, we create a wheel that never stops turning as the air pollution being the first step. The air pollution contributes to climate change creates higher temperature in turn higher temperatures causes some types of air pollution which means to my point. Air pollution is not just a problem in the air that we breathe, it also contributes many other environmental problems that affect our lives.

     Also, we are not the only ones that do the action in order to create air pollution. Nature also does it by itself. For instance, volcanic activities, wind and air currents, wildfires, microbial decaying processes and much more. Volcanic activities is volcanic eruptions emit a series of toxic gases including sulfur and chlorine as well as particulate matter but are usually restricted to localized areas, winds are air currents can mobilize pollutants from the ground the transport them over large areas, wildfires add carbon monoxide, as well as particulate matter, to the atmosphere could affect significant areas although in general they are restricted and may be contained, and finally microbial decaying processes are microorganisms which are present in any environment have a major role in natural decaying processes of living organisms as well as environmental contaminants this activity results in the natural release of gases especially methane gas. Besides that, even though there are too many ways that nature damages itself, it is nothing compared to our ways of damaging it.

    So how do we pollute air? Actually, there are too many ways that I can’t talk about all of them since it would took pages to do so. However, here some of the most popular ones. Mining and smelting emit into the air a variety of metals adsorbed on particulate matter that is suspended in the air due to crushing and processing of mineralogical deposits, mine tailing disposal due to their fine particulate nature constitute a source of metals to ambient air which could be spread by the wind over large areas, transportation emits a series of air pollutants through the tailpipe gases due to internal combustion of various fuels, coal power plants when burning coal this may emit a series of gases as well as particulate matter with metals and organic compounds, agriculture pollute the air usually through emissions of ammonia gas and the application of pesticides, herbicides and insecticides which contain toxic volatile organic compounds and finally smoking emits a series of toxic chemicals including a series of organic and inorganic chemicals, some of which are carcinogenic.

    As you may guess there many types of air pollution and here is some of them. Firstly, sulfur oxides poisoning, sulfur oxides are all around us. Some of them are naturally occurring and relatively harmless; some, however, can be man-made as a byproduct of industrial processing and are extremely toxic. Sulfur dioxide can be used for many different things such as; refrigerant, disinfectant and food preservative. Secondly, nitrogen oxides poisoning, nitrogen oxides are present all around us as well, as a mostly unfortunate byproduct of industrial civilization. While they have many beneficial uses, they can also be heavy pollutants. Nitric oxide is used to bleach rayon and produce nitric acid. Nitrogen dioxide is used to produce among other chemicals rocket fuels and explosives. It is sometimes used to bleach the floor. Lastly, carbon monoxide poisoning, carbon monoxide is a known pollutant, almost omnipresent in present-day cities around the world. It is produced during the process of burning fuels. This means it is present in vehicle exhaust and tobacco smoke, as well as unvented spaces where fuel is being used. Carbon monoxide is commonly used in production of several kinds of chemicals. It is part of the processing, preparation or production of phosgene, methanol etc.

    So at last we come to the question of what can I as a citizen to reduce air pollution. The followings are what we can do;

1-      Converse energy everywhere.

2-      Look for the energy star label when buying home of office equipment

3-      Use public transportation, bike or walk.

4-      Consider using gas logs instead of wood.

5-      Use environmentally safe paints and cleaning products.

6-      Refuel your car in the evening when it is cooler

                                                                                                                    UMUT KARADENİZ