786

Name:Waisuddin Amani

Class: S.Y.B.A

Subject: Environmental Science

Issue: Environmental issues and political election

College: Abeda Inamdar Senior College

Date: 7/10/2013

Preface

I Waisuddin Amani, am being cheerful coming up with a very informative, necessary to be understood about and at the same time very enjoyable topic, which talks about, what are the effects of .

As it covers the issue environment, then we are very pleased to be well versed about the issue because it is directly related to our lives.

We are directly affected by environment and we directly affect the environment either it is advantageous or harmful. Therefore, it is very important to speak, learn and be understood about the issue.

A human being goes along environment, in some words, it is environment which keeps us alive and healthy and complete our demands even without asking for it. For instance, Air, water, Sun, moon and star lights, animals and so many things else which a human being can’t live without.

Therefore, in one sense it is the core of our life and we should have full information about it and how to conserve it from the harms which are caused by us and how to help environment grow up and the people to live. In fact it is the duty of each individual to follow the instructions of Environmentalists in order to conserve our environment.

So, I collected some sort of information for the readers as it is my individual duty to inform each one of this important issue.

So, I hope the readers shall find it enjoyable, informative and very essential.

Actually, there is nothing like innovation in the topic, all the data is piled up from internet and library as main resources. The reference shall be given at the end of the topic.

Table of contents

1: what is environment? Page from 8 to 13

3: Effects of war on environment

Page from 16 to 53

A: Environmental security

Page from 19 to 20

B: Depleted Uranium

Page from 21 to 24

C: Infrastructure; Destruction to Infrastructure That Is

Vital For Public Health

Page from 25 to 26

D: 1991 Gulf war:

Page from 26 to 32

E: Forests/Biodiversity

Page from 33 to 38

F: Chemical and Biological Warfare

Page from 39 to 48

G: Nuclear; environmental impact of Nuclear Page from

49 to 52

H: Reforms needed:

Page from 53 to 54

4: Conclusion

Page from 55 to 59

5: References

Page…………………………..60

: Environmental issues and political election

Definition of environment:

Word "environment" is most commonly used describing "natural" environment and means the sum of all living and non-living things that surround an organism, or

group of organisms. Environment includes all elements, factors, and conditions that have some impact on growth and development of certain organism. Environment includes both biotic and abiotic factors that have influence on observed organism. Abiotic factors such as light, temperature, water, atmospheric gases combine with biotic factors (all surrounding living species). Environment often changes after some time and therefore many organisms have ability to adapt to these changes. However tolerance range is not the same with all species and exposure to environmental conditions at the limit of a certain organism's tolerance range represents environmental stress. Environmentalism is very important political and social movement with goal to protect nature environment by emphasizing importance of nature role in protection of the environment in combination with various actions and policies oriented to nature preservation. Environmentalism is movement connected with environmental scientists and many of their goals. Some of these goals include: 1. to reduce world consumption of fossil fuels2. To reduce and clean up all sorts of pollution (air, sea, river...) with future goal of zero pollution.3. Emphasis on clean, alternative energy sources that have low carbon emissions4. Sustainable use of water, land, and other scarce resources5. Preservation of existing endangered species6. Protection of biodiversity

First goal reducing the world consumption of fossil fuels is very important to fight against climate change and global warming phenomenon. Fossil (nonrenewable) fuels are mainly responsible for global warming as during the combustion of fossil fuels carbon dioxide (one of the greenhouse gases) gets released into the atmosphere. In fact reducing the emission of carbon dioxide is the most important thing if we want to successfully fight global warming.Reducing and cleaning up pollution is also very important task. Every day we hear the news about tremendous pollution of our air, seas, and rivers. Pollution creates unhealthy environment, and often causes many health problems and different diseases.

Now let us discuss the importance of the environment because each science is better known by its importance and key roles it plays.

Some of the importances of environment are indexed as fallow:

Our life-support system's health is maintained by all the species that make-up the biosphere—from the smallest to the largest (our biodiversity). The survival of all these species is interconnected and dependent on each other. Bacteria and insects break down organic material to produce soil and nutrients so plants can grow. Plants provide oxygen and food for animals and many other benefits. Bees, other insects, and animals pollinate the plants so they can reproduce and keep the cycle going. They also maintain the health of plants and spread their seeds. The actual processes that take place between species and the environment are extremely complex and vulnerable. If humanity causes the extinction of one species—it's really the extinction of many species and the decline of our life-support system for us and future generations. God's gift must not be taken for granted—it must be cared for. If not, humanity will face the grim consequences of its actions. 

Humanity has neglected to factor into the economic equation the tremendous benefits nature provides. Because the environment is our life-support system, it's impossible to truly estimate its value (it's priceless). However, economists and environmental scientists have estimated in dollars what it would cost us to accomplish the services nature provides. Using multiple databases, they estimate that nature provides $33 trillion dollars worth of services every year—that's nearly twice the annual Gross National Product or GNP of all the countries in the world combined.1 For example, forests prevent soil erosion, landslides, and flooding; maintain the purity of the air and water; affect local and global rainfall; temper climatic fluctuations; and promote watersheds and biodiversity. By retaining the proper moisture content within their foliage and soil, healthy forests prevent local fires from becoming widespread. Unfortunately, this moisture content is declining from over harvesting and fragmentation. Consequently, large-scale fires are becoming increasingly prevalent throughout the world. Other ecosystems like mangroves, wetlands, grasslands, shrubs, deserts, oceans, coral reefs, tundra-arctic regions, and so on provide similar and unique benefits. Biodiversity provides problem-solving raw materials for shelter and useful products, creates medicines, and allows us to pollinate and maintain healthy crops from being infested with harmful insects and diseases (without the need or hazards of chemicals or genetic engineering, which kill beneficial insects, additional Wildlife and plants). Although tropical forests contain some of the highest concentration of biodiversity on the planet, we destructively log more than 10

million acres of these forests each year (that’s approximately the size of a football field every 4 seconds) and efforts to promote sustainable forestry are largely failing.2 Scientists agree that the best way to protect biodiversity is to protect and maintain habitat large enough to accommodate a healthy ecosystem—tolerating small fragmented habitats will not preserve ecosystems or their biodiversity.

Approximately 40% of all prescriptions in the U.S. are either based on or synthesized from natural compounds found in microorganisms, plants, and animals.3 The economic value provided by just plant-based anticancer drugs in the U.S. is over $250 billion annually.4 In addition to nature providing us with penicillin, aspirin, morphine, and steroids; the medicine Taxol, which fights breast and ovarian cancer, comes from the bark of the pacific yew tree; the foxglove plant provides the drug digitalis which boosts the pumping action of weak hearts; and the rosy periwinkle plant is used to fight Hodgkin’s disease and childhood leukemia. Other candidates providing promising medicines include deep-sea sponges, tropical cone snails, dogfish sharks, the bark of the Holarrhena tree (found in Asia and Africa), and the plant Chonemorpha macrophylla (located in the foothills of the Himalayas). A microbe found in the hot springs of Yellowstone National Park provided an enzyme for mass-producing DNA.5 Physician and biochemist Michael Zasloff, "There’s so much we don’t know about the natural world…And we’re destroying large parts of it before we even appreciate our ignorance."

The National Geographic Society writes: The fragile balance of plants and animals that share the Earth took millions of years to develop. Some life-forms have persisted in nearly their original state, surviving episodes of mass extinction. Some, like ourselves, are relative newcomers. The ones that have perished will not return. Neither will the thousands of species that are disappearing each year due in large part to such human influences as habitat destruction, introduction of invasive species, and overharvesting. If we continue reducing Earth’s biodiversity at this rate, the consequences will be profound. The web of life connects the smallest bacterium to the giant redwood and the whale. When we put that web in peril, we become agents of calamity.7

Furthermore, religions around the world have long understood that the beauty, diversity, and wonder of nature is humanity's physical link with God—encouraging us to develop a spiritual relationship with our Creator. The destruction of this link and our life-support system should enrage all of humanity—especially religious groups—stewards of God's creation. People who believe exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist. —Kenneth Boulding

Effects of war on environment

“War is never an isolated act.”(Clausewitz, 1831)

Although ecological disturbances brought on by war have been occurring for thousands of years, modern day warfare has made its impact increasingly severe. Recognizing the long-term and wide-spread impacts caused by such degradation, experts have coined the term ecocide, literally meaning the killing of the environment.

As well as the cost to human life and society, there is a significant environmental impact of war.

 Scorched earth methods during, or after war has been in use for much of recorded

history but with modern technology war can cause a far greater devastation on the environment.

Unexploded ordnance can render land unusable for further use or make access across it dangerous or fatal.

War effect very hugely and badly on each aspect of human lives:

Social, human, financial, traditional and political of environment caused by War:

Environmental securityFrom the Romans in 146 BC salting fields around Carthage to impair food production to the looting of Iraqi nuclear facilities in recent months, the environmental destruction resulting from war has had an enduring legacy.[2] While the spraying of Agent Orange to defoliate jungles in Vietnam and burning of oil wells in Iraq have become icons of environmental warfare, many lesser-known but no less significant acts of ecocide have been perpetrated by warring states. Among

them are the extensive toll of water contamination on environmental and health security and the impact of combat on endangered species. Although by no means comprehensive, the following examples illustrate some of the different forms of environmental degradation caused by war. Environmental security examines the threat posed by environmental events and trends to individuals, communities or nations. It may focus on the impact of human conflict and international relations on the environment, or on how environmental problems cross state borders.

The Millennium Project did a global assessment of the definitions of environmental security and created a synthesis definition: Environmental Security is environmental viability for life support, with three sub-elements:

preventing or repairing military damage to the environment, preventing or responding to environmentally caused conflicts, and Protecting the environment due to its inherent moral value.

It involves and reflects the ability of an entity, whether a nation or a society, to withstand environmental asset scarcity, environmental risks or adverse changes, or environment-related tensions or conflicts. To put simply, human economic activity will generally result in CO2 emissions. This will bring about regional and global climatic and environmental changes and thus changes in agricultural output. Hence, altered resource availability will imply food shortages which will then cause political disputes, ethnic tension, and civil unrest. Consequently, Regional defense agreements will arise along with regional conflict, ultimately resulting in global conflict.

Environmental security is an important concept in two fields: international relations and international development.

Within international development, projects may aim to improve aspects of environmental security such as food security or water security.

Depleted Uranium:

Since the 1991 Gulf War, concern over the health and environmental effects of depleted uranium (DU) weapons has continued to grow. An extremely dense metal made from low-level radioactive waste, DU is principally used by the United States, but also by other countries such as Britain, in defensive military armor, conventional munitions, and some missiles. Its ability to penetrate the armor of enemy tanks and other targets more readily than similar weapons made of other materials has made DU extremely valuable to the US military. Perhaps not surprisingly, the US military has downplayed potential health risks posed by exposure to Depleted Uranium.

In many cases, current scientific studies have yet to substantiate links between reported health problems and the intensive use of DU weapons. However, other studies suggest DU is not as harmless as the United States and other “coalition forces” would like the public to believe.“I think the evidence is piling up that DU is not benign at all,” said Malcolm Hooper, an emeritus professor of medicinal chemistry at the University of Sunderland and chief scientific adviser to the UK Gulf Veterans Association. “The inhalation of these fine dust particles represents a health hazard that was known to the military as long ago as 1974,” he said in an interview with BBC news. The Royal Society, the UK’s national science academy, predicts that soldiers and civilians exposed to high DU levels may be at increased risk for kidney damage and lung cancer. Unfortunately, a DU clean-up and monitoring program, necessary to confirm suspected health threats, is on hold until coalition forces agree to reveal where and how much DU was used in Iraq.

It is uranium with a lower content of the fissile isotope U-235 than natural uranium. (Natural uranium is about 99.27% U-238, 0.72% U-235—the fissile isotope, and 0.0055% U-234). Uses of DU take advantage of its very high density of 19.1 g/cm3 (68.4% denser than lead). Civilian uses include counterweights in aircraft, radiation shielding in medical radiation therapy and industrial radiography equipment and containers used to transport radioactive materials. Military uses include defensive armor and armor-piercing projectiles.

Most depleted uranium arises as a byproduct of the production of enriched uranium for use in nuclear reactors and in the manufacture of nuclear weapons. Enrichment processes generate uranium with a higher-than-natural concentration

of lower-mass uranium isotopes (in particular U-235, which is the uranium isotope supporting the fission chain reaction) with the bulk of the feed ending up as

depleted uranium, in some cases with mass fractions of U-235 and U-234 less than a third of those in natural uranium. U-238 has a much longer half-life than the lighter isotopes, and DU therefore emits less alpha radiation than the same mass of natural uranium: the US Defense Department states DU used in US munitions has 60% the radioactivity of natural uranium.

Since the U-235 content of nuclear reactor fuel is reduced by fission, uranium recovered by nuclear reprocessing from spent nuclear reactor fuel made from natural uranium will have a lower-than-natural U-235 concentration. Such ‘reactor-depleted’ material will have different isotopic ratios from enrichment byproduct DU, and can be distinguished from it by the presence of U-236. Trace transuranics (another indicator of the use of reprocessed material) have been reported to be present in some US tank armor.

The use of DU in munitions is controversial because of questions about potential long-term health effects. Normal functioning of the kidney, brain, liver, heart, and numerous other systems can be affected by uranium exposure, because uranium is a toxic metal. It is weakly radioactive and remains so because of its long radioactive half-life (4.468 billion years for uranium-238, 700 million years foruranium-235).

The biological half-life (the average time it takes for the human body to eliminate half the amount in the body) for uranium is about 15 days. The aerosol or spoliation frangible powder produced during impact and combustion of depleted uranium munitions can potentially contaminate wide areas around the impact sites, leading to possible inhalation by human beings.

The actual level of acute and chronic toxicity of DU is also a point of medical controversy. Several studies using cultured cells and laboratory rodents suggest the possibility of leukemogenic, genetic, reproductive, and neurological effects from chronic exposure. A 2005 epidemiology review concluded: "In aggregate the human epidemiological evidence is consistent with increased risk of birth defects in offspring of persons exposed to DU.

" However, the World Health Organization, the directing and coordinating authority for health within the United Nations which is responsible for setting

health research norms and standards, providing technical support to countries and monitoring and assessing health trends, states that no risk of reproductive, developmental, or carcinogenic effects have been reported in humans due to DU exposure. This report has been criticized for not including possible long term effects of DU on the human body.

Infrastructure:

the degradation of infrastructure and basic services brought on by war can wreak havoc on the local environment and public health. Countries’ water supply systems, for example, can be contaminated or shut down by bomb blasts or bullet damage to pipes. In Afghanistan, destruction to water infrastructure combined with weakened public service during the war resulted in bacterial contamination, water loss through leaks and illegal use. The consequence was an overall decline in safe drinking water throughout the country.

Water shortages can also lead to inadequate irrigation of cropland. Agricultural production may also be impaired by intensive bombing and heavy military vehicles traveling over farm soil. The presence of landmines can also render vast areas of productive land unusable.

Additional war-related problems which compound degradation of the natural and human environment include shortages in cooking fuel and waste mismanagement during and after military conflicts.

During the most recent warfare in Iraq, individuals were forced to cut down city trees to use as cooking fuel. In Afghanistan, the creation of poorly located, leaky landfill sites resulted in contaminated rivers and groundwater.

Destruction to Infrastructure That Is Vital For Public Health

1. Geneva Convention: The public health consequences of war go far beyond the direct casualties caused by weapons. Water, for example, is essential to prevent health problems including malnutrition, gastro-intestinal infections and other communicable diseases. Without access to safe water sources the civilian population, especially children, is at risk. Therefore Protocol II of the Geneva Conventions explicitly states: "It is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, such as foodstuffs, agricultural areas for the production of foodstuffs, crops, livestock, drinkingwater installations and supplies (…)." The pre-war U.N. "Likely Humanitarian

Scenarios" report had already warned that damage to the electricity network would affect water supply and sanitation giving rise to the need for some 39 percent of the population to be provided with potable water. It added that a high number of indirect casualties might be because the outbreak of diseases in epidemic proportions was very likely. 

2. 1991 Gulf War:

Most civilian casualties in armed conflicts are the result of the destruction of civilian infrastructure that is essential for people's health. This was also the case for the first Gulf War that, according to the first post-war U.N. mission, had caused "apocalyptic damage" to the infrastructure and had reduced the country to "the pre-industrial age." (Roger Normand "Special Report: Water under Siege In Iraq. US/UK Military Forces Risk Committing War Crimes by Depriving Civilians of Safe Water" The Center for Economic and Social Rights, April 2003)

The vast majority of deaths in 1991 were caused by the destruction of the electric power grid and the ensuing collapse of the public health, water and sanitation systems, leading to outbreaks of dysentery, cholera, and other water-borne diseases. Therefore, one of the most comprehensive casualty assessments of the first Gulf War concludes that "the lethality of indirect effects of warfare can be much greater than the direct lethality of the weapons themselves." (Beth Osborne Daponte, M.A. "A Case Study in Estimating Casualties from War and Its Aftermath: The 1991 Persian Gulf War" 1993)

3. Attacks on infrastructure

3.1. Basra was the first city that suffered a humanitarian crisis because of the U.S.-British belligerence. On March 21, air raids destroyed high voltage lines and knocked out Basra's electrical power. That in turn disabled Basra's water and sanitation systems, including the Wafa' Al Qaeda Water Pumping Station, which pumps water from the Shatt al-Arab river to five water treatment plants that supply piped water to over 60 percent of Basra's 1.5 million residents. (Roger Normand "Special Report: Water under Siege In Iraq. US/UK Military Forces Risk Committing War Crimes by Depriving Civilians of Safe Water" The Center for Economic and Social Rights, April 2003)After one month of war, water shortage was still severe and water was reportedly sold on the black market at USD 1 per 1.5 liter bottle. ("Iraq: Basra's pivotal issue - water" UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Integrated Regional Information Network, 18 April 2003) The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) successfully restored running water to some of the population

on 2 April and continued to supply water trucks. At the end of April, water and electricity supplies in Basra were still at only 60 percent of their prewar levels. (International Committee of the Red Cross "ICRC: Iraq is at a crucial stage" 20 April 2003)

Apparently, the power and water supply of other cities were also targeted by the attacks. By 31 March, half the 1.2 million people in the beleaguered city lacked water. People reported that they were reduced to drinking "garden water" normally used for irrigation, which is not safe to wash in, let alone drink. Humanitarian agencies warned that the population of Basra, especially the young and the weak suffering the effects of years of economic sanctions, could be at risk of potentially fatal disease from drinking contaminated water.Amnesty International "Iraq: Civilians under fire - April 2003" AI Index: MDE14/071/2003On April 2, the ICRC reported that "entire towns and suburbs have now been without piped water for about a week, including several district towns north of Dhi Qar and Najaf but also towns south of Basra such as Al-Zubayr and Safwan." (ICRC, Daily Bulletin, 2 April 2003)In Nasiriyah, the water treatment plant was reported to be working only six hours a day as of April 20 and water treatment chemicals were in short supply. (UNICEF Iraq briefing note 20 April 2003)

3.2. On April 3, power to 90 percent of Baghdad was cut because of the damage to the Al-Doura power station during the American capture of Saddam International Airport. (Anthony Shadid "Blackout Increases Foreboding, Darkness Stills City Bracing for Chaos" Washington Post, 4 April 2003) One week later, after the capture of Baghdad by the U.S. troops, the ICRC reported that power cuts have continued ever since. At that time, major water treatment plants in the city were operational at about only 40-50 percent of their normal capacity. After the damage resulting from military operations and waves of vandalism and looting, the Baghdad water authorities reported the loss of all their assets and warehouse materials, including all spare parts, vehicles and other equipment. ("ICRC: The medical system of Baghdad totally disrupted by insecurity and looting" 12 April 2003)

3.3. A spokesperson of the World Health Organization warned already on April 6 that Iraq was facing the risk of an outbreak of cholera or other infectious illnesses, as clean drinking water was scarce and hospitals were overwhelmed. ("Iraq at risk of cholera epidemic" AFP, 7 April 2003)This assessment was echoed by UNICEF on April 21 when they reported a huge increase in child diarrheal cases in Baghdad. (United Nations "UN relief agencies praised Iraqi health workers" 21 April 2003) Although water was being supplied to most parts of Baghdad by the

end of April, the sanitation situation remained extremely critical and threatened public health. (United Nations "UN relief agencies report slow improvement in Iraq, but situation still 'precarious'" 22 April 2003)

4. Medical targets - Targeting ambulances and medical infrastructure

Medical infrastructure and personnel enjoys particular protection under the rules of war as laid down in the Geneva Law. Article 12 of Protocol II states: "Medical units shall be respected and protected at all times and shall not be the object of attack," while Article 15 adds that "Civilian medical personnel shall be respected and protected." Article 21 extends the protection also to medical vehicles, including ambulances.

4.1. There are disturbing reports that ambulances have deliberately been fired upon by U.S. troops.On April 9, MATW doctors Geert Van Mortar and Harrie Dewitt were at the Saddam Center for Plastic Surgery, which was functioning as a frontline hospital for the war-wounded. They witnessed how one of their ambulances that had left to transport patients to another hospital came back after a couple of minutes after it had been under fire by U.S. troops. Two of the patients it transported were dead and the driver and his co-driver had gunshot wounds.When Dr. Van Moorter went up to a U.S. officer to denounce their attitude, he answered that "the ambulance could contain explosives." (“US troops fire on ambulance, two killed" AFP, 10 April 2003; A resident of Najaf is also quoted in an April 29 AFP report saying that "Why did the Americans target civilians? They even hit ambulances trying to rescue those injured and killed five medics." in "US cluster bombing leaves Iraqi city angry over dead, maimed" AFP, 29 April 2003)

A similar justification for targeting civilian and medical vehicles alike was reportedly also given by Colonel Bryan P.McCoy, the commander of the Third Marine Battalion of the 4th Regiment. When distraught soldiers were complaining that they were uncomfortable shooting at civilians, the colonel countered that the Iraqis were using civilians to kill marines, that "soldiers were being disguised as civilians, and that ambulances were perpetrating terroristattacks.”)

4.2. Several hospitals sustained severe damage in air raids. On April 2, for example, U.S. aircraft hit a building opposite the Red Crescent maternity hospital in Baghdad and the blast was so strong that the hospital's roof collapsed. The maternity hospital is part of a Red Crescent compound that also includes their headquarters and a surgical hospital. (IFRC "Red Crescent maternity hospital damaged in attack" 3 April 2003) Patients and at least three doctors and nurses working at the hospital were wounded. (Simon Jeffery "Baghdad hospital bombed" The Guardian, 2 April 2003)

Forests/Biodiversity:

Throughout history, war has invariably resulted in environmental destruction. However, advancements in military technology used by combatants have resulted in increasingly severe environmental impacts. This is well illustrated by the devastation to forests and biodiversity caused by modern warfare.

Military machinery and explosives have caused unprecedented levels of deforestation and habitat destruction. This has resulted in a serious disruption of ecosystem services, including erosion control, water quality, and food production. A telling example is the destruction of 35% of Cambodia’s intact forests due to two decades of civil conflict. In Vietnam, bombs alone destroyed over 2 million acres of land. These environmental catastrophes are aggravated by the fact that ecological protection and restoration become a low priority during and after war.

The threat to biodiversity from combat can also be illustrated by the Rwanda genocide of 1994. The risk to the already endangered population of mountain gorillas from the violence was of minimal concern to combatants and victims during the 90-day massacre. The threat to the gorillas increased after the war as thousands of refugees, some displaced for decades, returned to the already overpopulated country. Faced with no space to live, they had little option but to inhabit the forest reserves, home to the gorilla population. As a result of this human crisis, conservation attempts were impeded. Currently, the International

Gorilla Programme Group is working with authorities to protect the gorillas and their habitats. This has proven to be a challenging task, given the complexities Rwandan leaders face, including security, education, disease, epidemics, and famine.

What is biodiversity?

More than 10 million different species of animals, plants, fungi and micro-organisms inhabit the Earth. They and the habitats in which they live represent the world's biological diversity, or biodiversity as it is often called. Humans use at least 40,000 species of plants and animals on a daily basis for food, shelter, clothing and medicinal needs.

Much of the global concern with deforestation focuses on the alarming loss of biodiversity. There is also considerable concern with the poverty of many forest dependent communities. Many poor communities around the world rely on local

biodiversity for a range of essential services. These include materials for housing and clothing, food from a range of wildlife species and traditional medicines derived from local plants and animals.

The populations of developed nations also depend on biodiversity for their survival and quality of life. Close to 40 percent of the pharmaceuticals used in the United States are either based on, or synthesized from, natural compounds found in plants, animals or microorganisms. The greatest value of biodiversity might still be unknown. Only a fraction of known species has been examined for potential medicinal, agricultural or industrial value. Nor do we fully understand how biodiversity contributes to the well-being of the larger global environment. And we are only just beginning to learn how biodiversity helps communities around the world satisfy their economic, dietary, health and cultural needs.

One thing is certain: the more we learn about biodiversity the more we realize how much the world depends on it. Yet whole species of plants, animals, fungi, and microscopic organisms are being lost at alarming rates.

Forest biodiversity

Forests are the most diverse ecosystems on land, because they hold the vast majority of the world's terrestrial species. Some rain forests are among the oldest ecosystems on Earth. Timber, pulpwood, firewood, fodder, meat, cash crops, fish and medicinal plants from the forest provide livelihoods for hundreds of millions

of people worldwide. But only a fraction of known species has been examined for potential medicinal, agricultural or industrial value.

A continuing threat

Forest biodiversity is threatened by rapid deforestation, forest fragmentation and degradation, hunting and the arrival of invasive species from other habitats. We are losing 12 million hectares of forest a year, much of it tropical rainforest with its unique and rich biodiversity.

How can we protect biodiversity?

One of the best ways to conserve forest biodiversity is to establish protected forest areas. But these areas must be of a certain size, or consist of a well-designed network of forest areas, to allow the local forest ecosystems to continue operating effectively.

The forest surrounding the protected area must then be carefully managed so that it serves as a buffer zone. These surrounding forests also allow local communities to earn a livelihood without infringing on the protected forest.

There have been numerous efforts aimed at safeguarding the world's biodiversity by protecting species in areas outside their original habitats.

For example, seeds of some of the most economically important trees are being conserved in seed centers and gene-banks as a way of protecting their genetic diversity.

But a large number of forest species have seed that do not survive storage, and many species of animals and plant-life are hard to protect once removed from their ecosystems.

CIFOR's focus

Biodiversity will continue to change and it is impossible to protect everything, so we need to decide which species are critically important and how they can best be maintained.

The challenge is to ensure that we do not focus only on the needs of developed nations and the world's economic elite.

We must also recognize and examine the priorities of local people who depend on forests, especially in developing nations.

CIFOR is meeting this challenge by studying forest biodiversity and increasing the understanding of this unique resource in ways that accommodate both local and global forest values.

It is also researching logging techniques that have a reduced impact on forests and biodiversity while still remaining profitable for logging companies.

Chemical and Biological Warfare:

One of the most striking examples of military disregard for environmental and human health is the use of chemical and biological agents in warfare. The American military’s use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War is one of the most widely known examples of using environmental destruction as a military tactic.

Agent Orange is a herbicide that was sprayed in millions of liters over approximately 10% of Vietnam between 1962 and 1971. It was used to defoliate tropical forests to expose combatants, and destroy crops to deprive peasants of their food supply. The environmental and health effects were devastating. The spraying destroyed 14% of South Vietnam’s forests, including 50% of the mangrove forests. Few, if any, have recovered to their natural state.

A key ingredient of Agent Orange is dioxin, the most potent carcinogen ever tested. It is therefore not surprising that Agent Orange has been linked to an array

of health problems in Vietnam including birth defects, spontaneous abortions, chloracne, skin and lung cancers, lower IQ and emotional problems for children (Forgotten Victims).

Similar to toxic chemical spills, Agent Orange continues to threaten the health of Vietnamese. In 2001, scientists documented extremely high levels of dioxin in blood samples taken from residents born years after the end of the Vietnam War. Studies attribute such high levels to food chain contamination: Soil contaminated with dioxin becomes river sediment, which is then passed to fish, a staple of the Vietnamese diet. This is a clear reminder that poisoning our environments is akin to poisoning ourselves.

Since the end of World War II there have been a number of treaties dealing with the limitations, reductions, and elimination of so-called weapons of mass destruction and/or their transport systems (generally called delivery systems). Some of the treaties are bilateral, others multilateral, or in rare cases universal. In the present paper only the chemical and biological weapons will be discussed, with emphasis on the Convention to eliminate them (CBWC).

The term "Weapons of Mass Destruction" (WMD), used to encompass nuclear (NW), biological (BW), and chemical weapons (CW), is misleading, politically dangerous, and cannot be justified on grounds of military efficiency. This had been pointed out previously by the author and discussed in considerable detail in ref.. Whereas protection with various degrees of efficiency is possible against chemical and biological weapons, however inconvenient it might be for military forces on the battlefield and for civilians at home, it is not feasible at all against nuclear weapons. Chemical weapons have shown to be largely ineffective in warfare;

biological weapons have never been deployed on any significant scale. Both types should be better designated as weapons of terror against civilians and weapons of intimidation for soldiers. Requirements on their transport system differ vastly from those for nuclear warheads. They are able to cause considerable anxiety, panic, and psychosis without borders within large parts of the population. Stockpiling of biological weapons is not possible over a long time scale. Only nuclear weapons are completely indiscriminate by their explosive power, heat radiation and radioactivity, and only they should therefore be called a weapon of mass destruction.

However, if one wants to maintain the term "Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)", it is a defendable view to exclude chemical and biological weapons, but put together with nuclear weapons all those that actually has killed millions of people in civil wars since World War II. These are mainly assault rifles, like AK47s, handguns, and land mines, to a lesser extent mortars, fragmentation bombs, and hand grenades.

This paper gives in Chapter 2 an overview on the history of chemical warfare, addresses in Chapter 3 the inventory of chemical weapons, discusses in Chapter 4 the elimination of chemical weapons and possible problems resulting for the environment (CW), reviews in Chapter 5 some non-lethal chemical weapons and chemical weapons which may be on the borderline to conventional explosives, and describes in Chapter 6 some of the old and new biological weapons (BW). Chapter 7 evaluates and compares the use of biological and chemical weapons by terrorists and by military in combat. The present status and verification procedures for the Chemical and Biological Weapons Convention (CBWC) are addressed in the conclusions in Chapter 8.

2. Chemical Warfare, Its History:

The Greeks first used sulfur mixtures with pitch resin for producing suffocating fumes in 431 BC during the Trojan War. Attempts to control chemical weapons date back to a 1675 Franco-German accord signed in Strasbourg. Then came the Brussels Convention in 1874 to prohibit the use of poison or poisoned weapons. During the First Hague Peace Appeal in 1899, the Hague Convention elaborated on the Brussels accord by prohibiting the use of projectiles that would diffuse "asphyxiating or deleterious" gases (Laws and Customs of Wars on Land). This Convention was reinforced during the second Hague conference in 1907, but prohibitions were largely ignored during World War I. At the battle of Ypres/Belgium, canisters of chlorine gas were exploded in April 1915 by Germany, which killed 5,000 French troops and injured 15,000. Fritz Haber, a Nobel price winner in 1919 for invention of ammonium fixation, had convinced the German Kaiser to use chlorine gas to end the war quickly. History taught us about a different outcome. During World War I all parties used an estimated 124,000 tons of chemicals in warfare. Mustard gas - "the king of battle gases" - then used on both sides in 1917 killed 91,000 and injured 1.2 million, accounting for 80% of the chemical casualties (death or injury). Chemical weapons caused about 3 percent of the estimated 15 million casualties on the Western Front. To put these numbers into perspective, the total loss of Allied lives was ³ 5 million, of the Central Powers 3.4 million, and the total of all wounded soldiers 21 million. Despite of its intensive use, gas was a military failure in WW I. The inhuman aspect and suffering was soon recognized and the year 1922 saw the establishment of the Washington Treaty, signed by the United States, Japan, France, Italy and Britain. In 1925 the Geneva Protocol for the Prohibition of the use in war of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases and Bacteriological Methods of

Warfare was signed, and it had been a cornerstone of chemical and biological arms control since then. The Geneva Protocol did neither forbid the stockpiling or the research on chemical weapons.

Despite the conventions, banning chemical weapons, Italians used them during the war 1935-36 in Ethiopia, the Japanese in China during World War II (1938-42), and they were used also in Yemen (1966-67). Various new chemicals were developed for use in weapons. Sarin, Soman, and VX followed Tabun, the first nerve gas, discovered in 1936.

During the Vietnam War (1961-1973), the US was accused of using lachrymatory agents and heavy doses of herbicides (defoliants) in much the same manner as chemical weapons.

Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons against Iraqi civilians as well as against Iran soldiers between 1980 and 1988. It is estimated that of the approximately 27,000 Iranians exposed to Iraqi mustard gas in that war through March 1987, only 265 died. Over the entire war, Iraqi chemical weapons killed 5,000 Iranians.

This constituted less than one percent of the 600,000 Iranians who died from all causes during the war.

The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling, and Use of Chemical Weapons and on Their Destruction (CWC), entered into force in 1997 after deposit of 65 ratification documents, and is signed as of May 1999 by 122 states-parties. There are 46 non-ratifying signatories, and 22 non-states parties.

3. The Inventory of Chemical Weapons:

Chemical weapons have been produced during the twentieth century by many countries and in large quantities. They are still kept in the military arsenals as weapons of in kind or flexible response. Old ammunition is partially discarded in an environmental irresponsible way.

3.1 Military value of chemical weapons:

By their nature, chemical arms have a relatively limited range: they create regional rather than global security problems, and slow the tempo of operations. In this, they are militarily more akin to conventional arms than to nuclear or biological weapons.

Even extended use of chemical weapons had no decisive impact on outcome of wars, had only local success, and made wars uncomfortable, to no purpose.

For this and other reasons it is difficult to see why they are around in the first place. However, they had been produced in enormous quantities and mankind has to deal with their very costly elimination.

Should scientists be held responsible for their invention, production, use, and also for the elimination of chemical weapons?

Certainly not entirely, since military and politicians demanded their production. However, we need the help of scientists for the difficult job of neutralizing or eliminating them.

3.2 Classification of chemical weapons:

Binary munitions contain two separated non-lethal chemicals that react to produce a lethal chemical when mixed during battlefield delivery. Unitary weapons, representing the by far largest quantity of the stockpile, contain a single lethal chemical in munitions. Other unitary agents are stored in bulk containers. The characteristics of chemical warfare agents and toxic armament wastes are described in detail in ref.

The reader is referred to this article, which summaries the chemical and physical characteristics of blister, blood, choking, nerve, riot control, and vomiting agents, as well as their effects on the human body.

3.3 Abandoned Weapons:

The easiest - say cheapest - way to eliminate (?) chemical weapons in the aftermath of World War II appeared to dump them into ocean [11]. There had been a worry that, after their defeat in 1945, Germans could be tempted to use part of their arsenal, which totaled 296,103 tons. Therefore, the weapons were captured and dumped into the sea. There are more than 100 seas dumping of chemical weapons that took place from 1945 to 1970 in every ocean except the Arctic. 46,000 tons were dumped in the Baltic areas known as the Gotland Deep, Bornholm Deep, and the Little Belt. According to The Continental Committee on Dumping the total was shared by 93,995 tons from the US, 9,250 tons from France, 122,508 tons from Britain, and 70,500 tons from Russia.

The US dumped German chemical weapons in the Scandinavian region, totaling between 30,000 and 40,000 tons, nine ships in the Skagerrak Strait and two more in the North Sea at depth of 650 to 1,180 meters.

The Russians alone have dumped 30,000 tons in an area, 2,000 square kilometers in size, near the Gotland and Bornholm Islands.

Between 1945 and 1949, the British dumped 34 shiploads carrying 127,000 tons of chemical (containing 40,000 tons mustard gas) and conventional weapons in the Norwegian Trench at 700 meters depth.The chemical weapons at the bottom of the Baltic Sea (mean depth of the Baltic Sea is 51 meters) and the North Sea represent a serious danger for the aquatic life. The shells of the grenades corrode and will eventually start to leak. The corrosion of these weapons is already so advanced that identification of the former owners is virtually impossible. Consequently, nobody can be made nowadays responsible for the ultimate elimination.

Nuclear:

The looting of Iraqi nuclear facilities in 2003, which occurred after U.S. led forces entered the country, has offered another blow to social and environmental security in the region. The most troubling of cases concerns the Tuwaitha nuclear plant, located 48 kilometers south of Baghdad, where an estimated two hundred blue plastic barrels containing uranium oxide were stolen. After dumping the radioactive contents and rinsing out the barrels in the rivers, poverty-stricken residents used the containers for storing basic amenities like water, cooking oil and tomatoes. Extra barrels were sold to other villages or used to transport milk to distanced regions, thus making the critical problem increasingly widespread

the mishandling of the radioactive material has profound effects on the environment and on the people and animals that depend on it. Toxic substances seep into the ground (rendering the soil unsafe), disperse through the air (spreading wide-scale pollution), and taint water and food supplies. Iraq’s national nuclear inspector has forecasted that over a thousand people could die of leukemia.

In addition to stolen radiological materials, computers and important documents have also gone missing. Given the right mix of technology and materials, radiological weapons such as “dirty bombs” and possibly even weapons of mass destruction (WMD) could be produced. It is worth noting that uranium oxide can be refined with the proper machinery and expertise in order to produce enriched uranium, a key ingredient in a nuclear bomb. There is concern that such materials could end up in the hands of the very terrorist groups the US and UK military are trying to disable. Unfortunately the coalition forces inability to effectively secure nuclear sites in Iraq may well have exacerbated the situation the war was supposed to avoid: the unlawful proliferation and use of WMD weapons.

Environmental impact of nuclear power:

The environmental impact of nuclear power results from the nuclear fuel cycle, operation, and the effects of nuclear accidents.

The routine health risks and greenhouse gas emissions from nuclear fission power are small relative to those associated with coal, but there are "catastrophic risks"[1] such as the possibility of over-heated fuel releasing massive quantities of fission products to the environment. The public is sensitive to these risks and there has been considerable public opposition to nuclear power.

The 1979 Three Mile Island accident and 1986 Chernobyl disaster, along with high construction costs, ended the rapid growth of global nuclear power capacity.

A major EU funded research study known as ExternE, or Externalities of Energy, undertaken over the period of 1995 to 2005 found that the environmental and health costs of nuclear power, per unit of energy delivered, was €0.0019/kWh. This is lower than that of many renewable sources including the environmental impact caused by biomass use and the manufacture of photovoltaic solar panels, and was over thirty times lower than coals impact of €0.06/kWh, or 6 cents/kWh. However the energy source of the lowest external costs associated with it was found to be wind power at €0.0009/kWh, which is an environmental and health impact just under half the price of Nuclear power.

In March 2011 an earthquake and tsunami caused damage that led to explosions and partial meltdowns at the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant in Japan. Concerns about the possibility of a large scale radiation leak resulted in 20 km exclusion zone being set up around the power plant and people within the 20–30 km zone being advised to stay indoors. John Price, a former member of the Safety Policy Unit at the UK's National Nuclear Corporation, has said that it "might be 100 years before melting fuel rods can be safely removed from Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant".

Waste stream:

Nuclear power has at least four waste streams that may harm the environment:

1. they create spent nuclear fuel at the reactor site (including plutonium waste)2. they produce tailings at uranium mines and mills3. during operation they routinely release small amounts of radioactive

isotopes4. during accidents they can release large quantities of dangerous radioactive

materials

The nuclear fuel cycle involves some of the most dangerous elements and isotopes known to humankind, including more than 100 dangerous radionuclide and carcinogens such as strontium-90, iodine 131 and cesium -137, which are the same toxins found in the fall out of nuclear weapons".[5]

High-level waste:

Around 20–30 tons of high-level waste are produced per year per nuclear reactor. The world's nuclear fleet creates about 10,000 metric tons of high-level spent nuclear fuel each year. Several methods have been suggested for final disposal of high-level waste, including deep burial in stable geological structures.

Reform is needed:

despite the long legacy of environmental destruction caused by warfare, the standards set by most conventions and protocols have proven inadequate in preventing and redressing environmental degradation brought on by war. Some experts maintain that the two principle international laws that could hold wartime aggressors accountable for ecological crimes are weak and outdated. Although the Iraqi military’s lighting and dumping of oil in Kuwait during the 1991Gulf War was labeled by UNEP as “one of the worst engineered disasters of humanity,” the government was never tried for their “scorched earth policy”. Some observers have called for a “Fifth Geneva Convention” to replace existing international norms.

Additional concerns focus on the geographical and temporal constraints placed by such agreements. While only a fraction of the armed conflicts in the world are international in scope, there is a lack of domestic regulations pre-empting war’s ecological harm. To make matters worse, international laws protecting the environment are mostly peacetime laws that are limited during conflict by the application of the Law of War, which focuses primarily on human needs.

Enforcement has also been an issue of serious debate. Some experts maintain that mitigating environmental atrocities from warfare requires clearer standards of conduct enforced by credible authorities able to impose penalties on those guilty of violations.

Such a precedent would change the way military operations perceive and use their physical environment. Rather than identifying their surroundings as providing “either logistical problems to be overcome and defeated or opportunities to be exploited,” preservation of the earth’s ecology would be valued for its intrinsic worth.

In effect, environmental security would be treated as a desirable end in itself rather than just a means of obtaining a competitive edge.

ConclusionNow that we know that war can seriously and badly damage our environment and us, then, it is our individually duty to know and get information how to conserve ourselves and environment.

Here are some steps:

1: Energy: - This is something that surrounds us and has an effect on each part of our lives. Energy exists in two forms; renewable- those that can be renewed and nonrenewable-those that cannot be renewed.

1. Wind Energy and2. Hydroelectric energy

Wind Energy is probably one of the best forms ways we have not because it is renewable but because of the amount of energy it can produce and the minimal amount of harm of it does to anything. Energy is gained from the wind as it passes over the blades over wind turbines and spins them. The spinning blades turn the turbines, which generate electricity. Simple as that you would say, and, I agree.It is quite different from nuclear powered plants and industries that use non-renewable resources such as oil and coals which send out dark billowing clouds of pollution that poisons the air we breathe, destroys the ozone layer and later fall back on the ground as acid rain. NO!! Wind energy is not like that, it is helpful rather than harmful.Next, let’s have a look at HYDROELECTRICAL POWER that gets its energy from moving water thus, the building of dams in many areas.Unlike Wind power, hydroelectric power also has a huge negative effect on the environment even though it is from a renewable source.The building of a dam floods the land upstream, which is a major point of concern because of the vegetation that ends up underwater. It will rot and when it does it will produce methane, which is a known greenhouse gas. The flooding also displaces people who live nearby and thus spurs economic imbalance. An excellent example of all of this is the AFSWAN HIGH DAM in Egypt, which was supposedly built to help people and instead created more harm. Even today people are dying from malaria from stagnant water present just because the dam is blocking the way. Now you tell me, is this helpful or harmful to the environment?.

The condition of the environment is a worldwide issue. Air and water pollution do not recognize borders; poor soil conditions in one nation may reduce another country’s food supply. At the same time, different regions do face different problems. One key distinction is between the environmental threats faced by developed nations, such as the United States and western European countries, and developing nations, such as India and Mexico. Most agree that these nations may have dissimilar crises, but debate remains over whether the solutions to their problems are unique as well.The environmental problems faced by developed nations are largely the result of their economic strength and higher standards of living. Overconsumption is cited by many observers as a cause of resource depletion in the First World. Americans, and to a lesser extent western Europeans, Japanese, and other residents of developed nations, are more likely to own one or more cars, purchase more food and clothes than subsistence levels require, and use considerable amounts of electricity. Americans consume a disproportionate amount of the planet’s resources. The United States is home to 5 percent of the world’s population but uses 25 percent of its resources. Overall, the developed world has 23 percent of Earth’s population but consumes two-thirds of the resources. Environmentalists contend that this high level of consumption will ultimately lead to the depletion of the planet’s resources, resulting in adverse consequences for human populations. Developed nations have reduced their rate of population growth, so overpopulation is not as great a problem as it was previously considered to be; however, because of the high level of consumption, each new person in a developed nation will use three times as much water and ten times as much energy as a child born in a developing country. The industries needed to create products for consumption also affect the environment through the emission of greenhouse gases and other wastes.

In contrast, the environmental crises faced by developing nations are the result of poverty. For example, Third World countries often lack the resources and sanitation facilities to provide the public with clean water. Tropical deforestation, caused by the slash-and-burn techniques of poor farmers, is another dilemma. However, as Rice University President Malcolm Gillis has observed, agriculture is not the only manifestation of the effects of poverty on deforestation. In most, but not all, poor nations, the role of poverty in deforestation is magnified by the ever-more-desperate search for fuel wood by impoverished people.” This search for wood is exacerbated by the key environmental problem in developing nations—overpopulation. Third World nations may consume vastly less than America and

Europe but their population growth rates are much higher. These nations lack the natural resources and social services that will be needed in order to provide their burgeoning populations with adequate food, shelter, and employment in the coming years. As developing nations move closer to First World status, the accompanying growth in industry could also affect the environment, especially through the emission of greenhouse gases. The global warming agreement reached in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997 exempted developing nations such as China, India, and Mexico from requirements to reduce their emissions. But according to the United Nations, countries exempted from the agreement will create 76 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions over the next 50 years.

The exemptions in the Kyoto agreement (which must be approved by 55 nations but as of this writing has not been submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification) raise the question of whether developed and developing nations should utilize the same methods in order to conserve the environment. If the environment truly is a worldwide issue, then the solutions may also be universal. However, international agreement on environmental issues is often difficult to achieve because countries are not at equivalent stages of social and economic development.

Developed nations rely significantly on government regulations to protect and restore the environment; however, many analysts—particularly Americans— believe that the same economic forces that create the wealth of developed countries can solve their environmental troubles. Industry, capitalism, and the free market system might create overconsumption, but they can also solve its ill effects, these commentators maintain. John Hood, the president of the John Locke Foundation, a policy institute that advocates the free market and limited government, writes, “Corporate America’s unique contribution to solving real environmental problems will come from innovation—finding new ways to produce goods and services, package and deliver them to consumers, and dispose of or recycle the wastes generated by their own production or by consumption.” In contrast, a system in which the government owns all the land or imposes strict command-and-control regulations on people and businesses is seen as ineffective. The poor environmental condition of communist nations is often cited by these observers as evidence of the inability of government regulations to conserve the environment.

As developing nations grow and become more economically self-sufficient, industrial solutions may become more viable in those countries. However, many commentators assert that Third World and post-communist countries should not

Follow the United States’ lead. These observers see industry as the planet’s foe rather than its savior; they believe companies are more likely to be motivated by the quest for profit than a desire to preserve the environment. A better way to improve the environment is to rely on a country’s indigenous values, many people maintain. For example, some environmentalists believe that the religious traditions of India promote ecologically friendly values, including vegetarianism and a moderate use of resources. They also prefer traditional agricultural methods, which do not rely on pesticides and chemical fertilizers and therefore do not cause groundwater pollution. Frances Cairn cross, a senior editor at the Economist, is among those who argue that if industry is to be relied upon, it should be as environmentally advanced as possible: “Industry in the developing countries has a special opportunity. Because it is making new, ‘Greenfield’ investments [investing in undeveloped and often unpolluted land], it can leap a stage and go straight to the best modern practice.”As noted earlier, the Kyoto global warming agreement reveals the difficulty of finding universal solutions to environmental problems. Developing nations would not consider even voluntary participation in emission reduction, arguing that such measures would impede their efforts to improve their economies and industries. Even within developed nations, the response to the treaty has varied. In June 1998, the European Union reached an agreement that will reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 8 percent. However, many people in the United States have more negative attitudes toward the agreement; they assert that achieving the reduced emission levels could hurt the nation’s economy. For example, some American analysts contend, companies might move their plants to developing nations, causing job losses in the United States. Moreover, they argue, emission controls could cause U.S. oil and gas prices to rise. Although the Clinton administration played a key role in reaching an agreement in Kyoto, President Bill Clinton is among those who believe developing countries need to limit their own greenhouse gases before the United States can ratify the treaty. Without the participation of the United States—the world’s leading polluter— the treaty might not succeed.

References

The resources have been used in collecting the topic is as below:

I have used library, net resources and some of my personnel books as a references to the topic written above:-

Library:

1: environmental science

2: war and environment

3: benefits of environment

Internet resources:

www.conservation.com

www.wellesley.edu/ environmental studies

www.ppu.org.uk

www.bbc.co.Uk

www.informaction.org

www.wikipedia.org

Personal data:

What is environment?

How to conserve environment: