Earth Science: Environmental Exploitation
Since the beginning of the industrial age, the exploitation of the natural environment by humankind has taken a turn for the worse.
Natural resources are depleted and waste is produced at a higher rate than the soil, air, rivers, and oceans can sustain.
Earth – Environmental Protection – Polluted Air
For a long time, pollutants such as carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and nitrogen oxides were blown into the air without restriction. The results are global warming, acid rain, smog, and ozone depletion in the stratosphere.
The composition of the air has changed significantly since the beginning of industrialization—unfortunately for the worse. The burning fossil fuels (such as coal and crude oil to run power stations and motor vehicles) emits particulate matter and numerous chemical compounds including sulfur, nitrogen, and carbon oxides. Once these compounds are released into the atmosphere, they react with water vapor to create sulfuric acid and nitric acid, which later return to the Earth’s surface in the form of acid rain.
This results in large-scale forest decline. Forests in North America and Europe have been especially affected. The reason for the trees dying is that acid rain directly attacks the leaves and needles of the trees, and this prevents photosynthesis from working effectively. In addition, dissolved heavy metals and aluminum leak into the ground. Here, they poison bacteria living in the soil and damage the fragile root tips.
Trees can no longer effectively take in water and nutrients. The consequences of the increasing acidification of rivers and lakes include fish dying on a large scale as well as a reduction in biodiversity. The release of carbon dioxide has also seriously impacted our environment. By now, there is more car- bon dioxide being emitted than plants can take in and convert into oxygen.
The situation is worsened by ongoing massive deforestation and burning of tropical rain forests: the “green lungs” of the Earth. The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is increasing; this is a fact that will not be changed by the odd prevention measure. It traps the heat emitted by the Earth and prevents the release of heat radiation into space.
Global climate change is the consequence of the greenhouse effect enhanced by human activity. The process is further accelerated by the emission of large quantities of chlorine compounds. As a result, the ozone layer has developed holes that allow dangerous UV radiation to reach the Earth directly and unfiltered.
SMOG
Smog is a combined word derived from smoke and fog. Winter smog is a mixture of fine particulate matter, fog, soot, and sulfuric emissions. This condition occurs above cities and heavy industrial areas during atmospheric inversions in the winter.
Summer smog is mainly formed by nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons emitted by motor vehicles. These compounds react with the sunlight, which creates aggressively harmful ozone.