Introduction to Pollution Science - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0854048294 ISBN 13: 9780854048298

Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry, 2006

Synopsis

The basics of environmental pollution, drawing upon chemistry, physics and biological sciences.

About this title

About the Author

Roy Harrison OBE is Queen Elizabeth II Birmingham Centenary Professor of Environmental Health at the University of Birmingham. In 2004 he was appointed OBE for services to environmental science. Professor Harrison’s research interests lie in the field of environment and human health. His main specialism is in air pollution, from emissions through atmospheric chemical and physical transformations to exposure and effects on human health. Much of this work is designed to inform the development of policy.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

An Introduction to Pollution Science

By Roy M. Harrison

The Royal Society of Chemistry

Copyright © 2006 The Royal Society of Chemistry
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-85404-829-8

Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction Roy M. Harrison, 
Chapter 2 The Atmosphere J.A. Salmond, A.G. Clarke and A.S. Tomlin, 
Chapter 3 The World's Waters: A Chemical Contaminant Perspective James W. Readman, 
Chapter 4 Soils and Land Contamination S.J.T. Pollard and M.G. Kibblewhite, 
Chapter 5 Investigating the Environment C. Nicholas Hewitt and Rob Allott, 
Chapter 6 Ecological and Health Effects of Chemical Pollution Steve Smith, 
Chapter 7 Environmental Management Jane Kinniburgh, 
Subject Index, 

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

ROY M. HARRISON

School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK

1.1 WHAT IS POLLUTION SCIENCE?

There are various definitions for environmental pollution, all of which contain two key components. The first is that pollution involves some kind of change to the environment. The most obvious kinds of changes are the addition of man-made chemicals that do not occur naturally. Equally important, however, can be the additions of chemicals which do occur naturally in the environment, provided the resultant concentration meets the second criterion. This criterion is that for the phenomenon to be described as pollution, then the perturbation suffered by the environment must in some way be harmful. Not all pollution phenomena are the results of chemicals in the environment. Other important forms of pollution include thermal pollution, an example of which is the discharge of relatively warm power station cooling waters into coastal seas where they can lead to a significant change in the ecology of aquatic organisms. A further example is that of light pollution, caused by the massive amount of urban street lighting, which has a deleterious effect on the environment through obscuring our view of stars in the nighttime sky. Noise pollution has important aesthetic impacts through causing widespread annoyance, but is increasingly suspected of causing adverse effects on health.

This book concerns itself almost exclusively with chemical pollution. It considers the environment as a set of compartments that is familiar to us from our everyday existence. Therefore, separate chapters deal with the atmosphere, the world's waters, and soils and the solid earth. While such a subdivision is convenient in that pollutants behave very differently in each of these media, it is of course not the full story. The atmosphere is very mobile and many pollutants have lifetimes in the atmosphere of only hours or days, although some remain for much longer. Pollutants in the aquatic environment, unless rapidly biodegraded, will often be present for days or weeks, and persistent pollutants for many years. In soils and sediments, however, pollutants can remain relatively immobile for tens or hundreds of years. The rates of mixing are also very different. An atmospheric pollutant with a lifetime of more than a year will become globally mixed, whereas the same degree of mixing throughout the oceans will take centuries and throughout the solid earth will never occur unless there are pathways through water and air. Exchange processes between these major environmental compartments can be very important. Thus, for example, the largest inputs of some pollutants to the North Sea arise through deposition from the atmosphere. There are other examples where pollutants discharged to the sea can become suspended in sea spray and lead to contamination of bot

Edition details

• Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0854048294
• ISBN 13: 9780854048298
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 344
• Editor: R M Harrison