History Of Air Pollution

AIR POLLUTION, CONTAMINATION OF THE AIR BY NOXIOUS GASES AND MINUTE PARTICLES OF SOLID AND LIQUID MATTER (PARTICULATES) IN

CONCENTRATIONS THAT ENDANGER HEALTH. THE MAJOR SOURCES OF AIR POLLUTION ARE TRANSPORTATION ENGINES, POWER AND HEAT

GENERATION, INDUSTRIAL PROCESSES, AND THE BURNING OF SOLID WASTE.

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Introduction

In 2004Beijing was ranked as the 13th most polluted city in the world in 2004. The World Bank list included many cities in China and India, where rapidly expanding industrial sectors were contributing to the build-up of air pollution.

In Europe, rapid economic growth was followed only later by pollution control and China is following a similar trend. However, problems in Beijing have been exacerbated more recently by the large amount of building work in the city, some of it generated by the games themselves, which in turn is causing a lot of dust and contributing to PM10

levels .

In 2005In 2005, 89% of the world's population lived in areas where the World Health Organization Air

Quality Guideline of 10 μg/m(3) PM(2.5) (annual average) was exceeded. Globally, 32% of the

population lived in areas exceeding the WHO Level 1 Interim Target of 35 μg/m(3), driven by high

proportions in East (76%) and South (26%) Asia. The highest seasonal ozone levels were found in

North and Latin America, Europe, South and East Asia, and parts of Africa. Between 1990 and

2005 a 6% increase in global population-weighted PM(2.5) and a 1% decrease in global

population-weighted ozone concentrations was apparent, highlighted by increased

concentrations in East, South, and Southeast Asia and decreases in North America and Europe.

Combined with spatially resolved population distributions, these estimates expand the evaluation

of the global health burden associated with outdoor air pollution.

In 2006When Americans heard on the radio and read in the newspaper that China surpassed the United States as the greatest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world in 2006, they were overcome with a sense of pride and accomplishment-or at least I was. A load was lifted off the United States' shoulders, because now, it was China's turn to sit in the ‘international hot seat' and take the blame as the main culprit for anthropogenic global warming. As long as China stayed the world's greatest emitter of pollutants, America had one less problem to worry about, right?Wrong! No matter what country or on what continent a person lives on, when pollutants are released, everybody is affected. After all, we do share the same atmosphere and breathe the same air. Even the world's greenest country, Iceland, which depends on coal for only 18% of its energy, suffers from the actions of other countries, such as China which depends on coal for 70% of its energy. Once pollutants are released, global problems arise.

Air Pollution in ChinaA developing country in the midst of industrialization and urbanization, China requires a substantial amount of energy to run their industrial plants, factories, and power plants. Relying heavily on coal, the dirtiest energy source, to fulfill these energy requirements, China is now the largest consumer of coal and the leading producer of greenhouse gases in the world. Each year, its emissions rise 10%, and in cities such as Beijing, the air pollution levels are 100 times higher than the limits set by the United Nation's World Health Organization. Additionally, 40% of cities are exceeding their residential area air quality standard. Looking up at the sky, one can expect to see a thick, haze of lingering smog, so is it really a wonder why only 1% of the Chinese population in cities breathes clean air? Do the thousands of Chinese deaths each year due to respiratory illnesses still seem bizarre, and is it now understandable why cancer is the leading cause of death?

In 2007Joseph Kahn and Jim Yardley of the New York Times in a 2007 article about China's pollution problem stated that "Environmental degradation is now so severe, with such stark domestic and international repercussions, that pollution poses not only a major long-term burden on the Chinese public but also an acute political challenge to the ruling Communist Party." Main points from the article included.

1.According to the Chinese Ministry of Health, industrial pollution has made cancer China’s leading cause of death.2.Every year, ambient air pollution alone killed hundreds of thousands of citizens.3.500 million people in China are without safe and clean drinking water.4.Only 1% of the country’s 560 million city dwellers breathe air considered safe by the European Union, because all of its major cities are constantly covered in a "toxic gray shroud". Before and during the 2008 Summer Olympics, Beijing was "frantically searching for a magic formula, a meteorological dues ex machine, to clear its skies for the 2008 Olympics."5.Lead poisoning or other types of local pollution continue to kill many Chinese children.6.A large section of the ocean is without marine life because of massive algal blooms caused by the high nutrients in the water.7.The pollution has spread internationally: sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides fall as acid rain on Seoul, South Korea, and Tokyo; and according to the Journal of Geophysical Research, the pollution even reaches Los Angeles in the USA.8.The Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning in 2003 had an internal and unpublished report which estimated that 300,000 people die each year from ambient air pollution, mostly of heart disease and lung cancer.9.Chinese environmental experts in 2005 issued another report, estimating that annual premature deaths attributable to outdoor air pollution were likely to reach 380,000 in 2010 and 550,000 in 2020.A 2007 World Bank report conducted with China's national environmental agency found that "...outdoor air pollution was already causing 350,000 to 400,000 premature deaths a year. Indoor pollution contributed to the deaths of an additional 300,000 people, while 60,000 died from diarrhea, bladder and stomach cancer and other diseases that can be caused by water-borne pollution." World Bank officials said "China’s environmental agency insisted that the health statistics be removed from the published version of the report, citing the possible impact on 'social stability'

In 2008As noted in the 2008 World’s Worst Polluted Places Report, biomass fuels are typically burned in rudimentary stoves. Importantly, few of these fully combust the fuel, therefore resulting in inefficient use of precious fuel and unnecessarily large amounts of air emissions [6]. The high amount of emitted particulate coupled with usually poor ventilation produces indoor concentrations of toxic fumes, which pose families at health risks. Those most affected are women, who do most of the cooking, as well as infants, who are often times strapped to the backs of their mothers.

WasteThe small level of "environmental awareness" has hindered the development of proper recycling systems in China's cities as the amount of waste increases . In 2012 the waste generation in China was 300 million tones (229.4 kg/cap/yr).[

Beginning from June 1, 2008, all supermarkets, department stores and shops throughout the entire country of China are prohibited from giving out free plastic bags. Stores must clearly mark the price of plastic shopping bags and are banned from adding that price onto the price of products. The production, sale and use of ultra-thin plastic bags - those less than 0.025 millimeters, or 0.00098 inches, thick - are also banned. The State Council called for "a return to cloth bags and shopping baskets." This ban, however, does not include the widespread use of paper shopping bags at clothing stores or the use of plastic bags at restaurants for takeout food . Since the ban, ten percent fewer plastic bags have been thrown away.

In 2009 in a 2009 literature review in Review of Environmental Economics and Policy noted the wide discrepancy between the reassuring view in some Chinese official publications and the exclusively negative view in some Western sources such as the above NYT article. The review stated that "although China is starting from a point of grave pollution, it is setting priorities and making progress that resemble what occurred in industrialized countries during their earlier stages of development." Environmental trends were described as uneven. Quality of surface water in the south of China was improving and particle emissions were stable. But NO2 emissions were increasing rapidly and SO2 emissions had been increasing before decreasing the last year (2007) for which data was available.

In 2010We have been rolling out the India- and China-specific numbers, as they speak more directly to national leaders than regional numbers,” said Robert O’Keefe, the vice president of the Health Effects Institute, a research organization that is helping to present the study. The organization is partly financed by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the global motor vehicle industry. What the researchers called “ambient particulate matter pollution” was the fourth-leading risk factor for deaths in China in 2010, behind dietary risks, high blood pressure and smoking. Air pollution ranked seventh on the worldwide list of risk factors, contributing to 3.2 million deaths in 2010. By comparison with China, India, which also has densely populated cities grappling with similar levels of pollution, had 620,000 premature deaths in 2010 because of outdoor air pollution, the study found. That was deemed to

be the sixth most common killer in South Asia .

In 20111. EgyptAVERAGE PM2.5 POLLUTION: 74 ug/m3Deaths caused by outdoor air pollutionIschemic heart disease (40 per cent)Stroke (40 per cent)Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (11 per cent)Lung cancer (6 per cent)Acute lower respiratory infections in children (3 per cent)Source: World Health OrganizationAVERAGE PM10 POLLUTION: 136 ug/m3YEAR OF DATA: 2011

2. United Arab Emirates

AVERAGE PM2.5 POLLUTION: 61 ug/m3AVERAGE PM10 POLLUTION: 161 ug/m3YEAR OF DATA: 2011The population of the United Arab Emirates is more than 9 million and the life expectancy is 77. It is part of the WHO's Eastern Mediterranean region and ranked as high income. Some of its major industries include oil production, textiles and agriculture.Al Gharbia - Biya Zayed was rated 52nd on the list of cities with high air pollution, with a PM2.5 rate of 64 ug/m3.

In 20121. QatarAVERAGE PM2.5 POLLUTION: 92 ug/m3AVERAGE PM10 POLLUTION: 165 ug/m3YEAR OF DATA: 2012More than 2 million people live in Qatar and the life expectancy is 78. It is part of the WHO's Eastern Mediterranean region and ranked as high income. The country's major industry is oil production.The air in the country's capital, Doha, was ranked 12th most polluted, with a PM2.5 of 93 ug/m3. Al Wakrah came in at number 25 with 85 ug/m3.

 

In 2013Rationale: The strength of the association between outdoor air pollution and hospital admissions in children has not yet been well defined. Objectives: To estimate the impact of outdoor air pollution on respiratory morbidity in children after controlling for the confounding effects of weather, season, and other pollutants. Methods: The study used data on respiratory hospital admissions in children (three age groups: < 1, 1–4, and 5–14 years) for five cities in Australia and two in New Zealand. Time series of daily numbers of hospital admissions were analyzed using the case-crossover method; the results from cities were combined using a random-effects meta-analysis. Measurements and Main Results: Significant increases across the cities were observed for hospital admissions in children for pneumonia and acute bronchitis (0, 1–4 years), respiratory disease (0, 1–4, 5–14 years), and asthma (5–14 years). These increases were found for particulate matter with a diameter less than 2.5 μm (PM2.5) and less than 10 μm (PM10), nephelometry, NO2, and SO2. The largest association found was a 6.0% increase in asthma admissions (5–14 years) in relation to a 5.1-ppb increase in 24-hour NO2. Conclusions: This study found strong and consistent associations between outdoor air pollution and short-term increases in childhood hospital admissions. A number of different pollutants showed significant associations, and these were distinct from any temperature (warm or cool) effects.

1.2013. Read More: http://www.atsjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1164/rccm.200411-1586OC#.VEJZ2xYyLzs2.2012 ,2011,2010 & 2009http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-08/10-countries-with-the-worlds-dirtiest-air/5438872

3.2008, 2007 ,2006 , 2005 & 2004http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2006/pr52/en/

4.