Introduction to Air Pollution

• Pollution is an introduction of harmful materials into the environment.
• Pollutants are the harmful materials that can be natural such as volcanic ash or human activities.
• Pollutants damages the air, water, and land quality.
• Many things that are useful to people produce pollution like cars, coal burning, industries, homes, and pesticides.
• Pollutants in volcanis ash contains fine particles and chemicals like silica, which if inhaled, can result to difficulty in breathing.
• Pollution can spread even in areas where no people live.. Although the urban area experience a more polluted environment than the countryside, it can spread anywhere.
• Pollutants can spread through the following: air, water, ocean currents, fish migration, winds, and smoke.
• Air pollution is an introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or microorganisms into the atmosphere at enough high concentrations to harm plants, animals, and materials, or alter ecosystems.
• Chemicals for Air pollution: SO2, NOx, VOCs, heavy metals (lead and mercury)
• Particulate matter: dust, smoke, soot, aerosols
• Microorganisms: bacteria, viruses, fungi, and pollen (airborne)
• Air pollution can occur naturally from sources such as volcanoes and fires, or it can be anthropogenic activities.
• Inputs are where pollutants come from; Outputs are things that help clean or change the polluted air.
• Input: cars, airplanes, or plants releasing substances into the air; Outputs: plants, soil, clouds, and components of the atmosphere like clouds, particles, or gases.
• TRUE OR FALSE: Air pollution does not damage human health, crops and ecosystems. buildings and infrastructures - FALSE
• Greenhouse gases pollutants are altering our climate.
• Aesthetic degradation such odors and lost visibility are also important consequences of air pollution. These factors rarely threaten life or health directly, but they can strongly impact the quality of our life.
• Natural factors degrade air quality including: trees, decaying vegetation, forest fires.
• Clean Air Act was imlemented in 1963, amended in 1970, and because of its huge positive impact, it adopted by many countries in different continents; not only on the environment but also on people's health.
• The six pollutants that significantly threaten human well-being, ecosystems, and structures are sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, carbon monoxide, particulate matter, tropospheric ozone, and lead.
• Primary pollutants are released directly from the source into the air in a harmful form; Secondary pollutants are converted to a hazardous form after they enter the air or are formed by chemical reactions as components of the air mix and interact.
• Solar radiation, or sunlight often fuel chemical reactions in the atmosphere.
• These chemical reactions from sunlight create harmful pollutants like photochemical oxidants and atmospheric acids that can harm health and the environment.
• Many pollutants originate from point source like smokestacks, which are structures that release smoke and emissions from various sources such as factories, locomotives, and ships.
• Fugitive emissions are those not released through smokestacks.
• Sulfur dioxide is a harmful and corrosive gas emitted from burning sulfur-containing fuels, purifying sour natural gas or oil, and industrial processes like ore smelting.
• SO2 are colorless, corrosive, and smells bad.
• Sulfuric acid (H2SO4) forms when it mixes with atmospheric oxygen and water vapor, which is a key contributor to acid rain.
• Hydrogen sulfide is a strong-smelling and harmful air pollutants from pig manure lagoons and mercaptans from paper mills.
• Nitrogen oxide is a highly reactive gas formed when nitrogen in fuel or in the air is heated during combustion to temperatures above 650 degrees Celsius in the presence of O2.
• Nitrous oxide is produces from soil denitrification and is a significant greenhouse gas.
• Nitrogen oxide + water = nitric acid (HNO3) is a major component of acid rain.
• 95% of human caused NOx emissions come from transportation and electric power.
• Anthropogenic sources contribute 60% of the global emissions of around 230 million metric tons of reactive nitrogen compounds annually.
• Use of agricultural fertilizer use is a significant contributor to airborne NOx through excess runoff nitrogen, leading to eutrophication of water bodies.
• Carbon monoxide is a colorless, odorless, non-irritating, but highly-toxic gas that is mainly produced from incomplete burning of fuels like charcoal, coal, or gas.
• When we breathe in, CO stops our blood from carrying oxygen to our cells by attaching it to the hemoglobin- a protein that carries O2 in our blood.
• Catalytic converters (cars) help decrease CO emissions by fully converting carbon to CO2.
• CO2 is the predominant /main carbon form in the air.
• Particulate matter contain solid particles or liquid droplets suspended in a gaseous medium.