Environmental Issues: Air Pollution and its Control

Air pollution describes any physical, chemical, or biological changes in the air. It refers to any contamination of air by harmful gases, dust, smoke affecting plants, animals, and humans. There is the presence of various gases in the air such as nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide, etc. the increase or decrease in the concentration of these gases is harmful to survival.

The increase in these gases has resulted in a sudden increase in the earth’s temperature which leads to global warming.

Types of Air pollutants

The substances causing pollution are known as pollutants. There are 2 types of air pollutants:

Primary pollutants: these are the ones that are emitted directly from the source into the atmosphere and cause air pollution. These include- sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, etc.

Secondary pollutants: these pollutants are formed in the air as a result of chemical or physical interactions between the primary pollutants or between the primary pollutants and other atmospheric components. It includes ozone, nitrogen dioxide, secondary particulate matter, etc.

Causes of Air Pollution

When we study the causes of air pollution we generally enlist a series of activities that create this pollution. The major six causes of air pollution we have discussed in this article:

Burning of fossil fuels: combustion of fossil fuels like coal and petroleum for the production of energy in power plants results in the emission of sulfur dioxide which is a major cause of air pollution.

Millions of vehicles running on the road are powered by gasoline and diesel resulting in the burning of petroleum for energy production. Since petroleum consists of hydrocarbons engines do not burn them cleanly. Thus, this leads to the emission of pollutants such as PM, nitric oxide, carbon monoxide, and lead from the vehicles causing high levels of pollution.

Agricultural Activities: ammonia being a very hazardous gas in the atmosphere is a very common by-product of agricultural activities. Nowadays, the use of insecticides, pesticides has increased a lot by the farmers. These release toxic chemicals into the air, thus causing pollution. Another way that causes air pollution is the burning of fields and old crops into the fire, these emit poisonous gases into the atmosphere.

Waste in Landfills: landfills refers to areas in which wastes are buried. These buried wastes produce methane. Methane is one of the major greenhouse gases which is highly inflammable and hazardous. Electronic wastes or E-wastes are another major cause of chemical leaching, burning wires, etc.

Exhaust from Factories and Industries: various industries and factories emit large amounts of poisonous gases such as carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, organic compounds, and chemicals into the air thus, depleting the quality of air.

Mining Activities: it refers to the process of extraction of minerals below the earth via the use of large equipment. During this process, the chemicals released cause air pollution.

Domestic Sources: cleaning products and paints used in houses emit toxic chemicals that are released into the atmosphere. The fragrance these paints have is due to these toxic chemicals that pollute the air.

Effects of Air Pollution

The effects that air pollution have on the environment are:

 Diseases: air pollution causes various respiratory and heart diseases. People living in highly polluted areas are more prone to asthma and pneumonia.

Global Warming: emission of greenhouse gases causes an imbalance in the gaseous composition of the atmosphere. This leads to a sudden increase in the atmospheric temperature of the earth, melting of glaciers, and an increase in sea level.

Acid Rain: burning of fossil fuels results in the emission of harmful gases such as nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide in the air, when rainfall occurs the water droplets mixes with these pollutants and become acidic and fall as acid rain that damages plants, animals, and humans live, also the monuments are getting damaged.

Ozone layer depletion: release of hydrochlorofluorocarbons, chlorofluorocarbons, and halons in the atmosphere leads to the depletion of the ozone layer.

Control of Air Pollution

Various methods that we can use to lower air pollution are listed below:

Energy Conservation: various electrical appliances use fossil fuels to generate energy. So we must not forget to switch off these appliances when not in use. We can increase the use of energy-deficient devices such as CFLs to control pollution to a greater extent.

Avoid Using Vehicles: one must limit the use of vehicles unless necessary. We can use public transport for traveling; this will not only reduce pollution but also conserves energy.

Use of clean energy sources: one must be thinking about what clean energy refers to, so clean energy refers to the sources that provide energy but without causing pollution such types of sources are: solar, wind, and geothermal energies. 

Tree Plantation: planting trees reduces the ill effects of air pollution. The most effective way is to plant trees in areas of high pollution levels.

Fuel Substitution: nowadays in many parts of India the vehicles that are not fully operating with ideal emission engines are replaced by CNG fueled vehicles.

Conclusion

Air pollution possesses many ill effects on the health of people. It causes many skins, respiratory and heart-related disorders in human beings. So it must be our priority to control air pollution via various ways that are discussed in this article.