Air Pollution (2)

4) Methane

Comes from:
- Decomposition of vegetable matter
- rice field
- cattle ranching
- natural gas
- mines

Hazards:
- highly flammable
- greenhouse gas

Prevention:
- Cattle and other ruminant animals should be given improved diet
- Animal manure and rotting vegetation can be used as biomass fuel

5) Unburnt hydrocarbons

Comes from:
- Internal combustion engines
- Because of the limited supply of air inside the engines some of it remains unburnt and escapes as
gaseous hydrocarbons.

Hazards:
- Carcinogenic
- forms photochemical smog
- can act as greenhouse gases contributing to global warming.

Prevention:
- Install catalytic converters in cars
- Reduce number of cars on road
- Create efficient engines in cars to ensure complete hydrocarbon combustion

6) Ozone
- It is an allotrope (two/three different forms of a pure element) of oxygen having structural formula O 3
having characteristic odour.
- High up in the atmosphere ozone is beneficial as it helps to filter out high levels of UV radiation.
Comes from:
- It is formed when an electrical spark passes through air. This is because it reacts with the UV radiation
in sunlight to produce a 'photochemical smog'.

Hazards

This is because it reacts with the UV radiation in sunlight and unburnt hydrocarbons to produce a
'photochemical smog' that causes headache, eye, nose and throat irritation.
- It corrodes and kills plants and trees

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Prevention
- Dont use CFCs/replace it with HCFCs which destroys faster.

7) Dust and Smoke

- The larger, heavier dust particles will settle quickly but the smaller particles may remain suspended in
the air for a long time.

Comes from:
- building work
- mining activities
- forest fires
- incomplete combustion of fuels.

Hazards:
- irritate lungs, causing bronchitis and other lung-related diseases.

8) Lead compounds

Comes from:
- Combustion of leaded petrol in car engines
- lead compounds are added to petrol to make it heavier so that it does not ignite too soon.

Hazards:
- when breathed in can build up inside the body and are toxic and poisonous
- Causes lead poisoning which leads to brain damage.

Uses of Oxygen

 As rocket fuel
 In steel making, to burn off impurities
 In oxy-acetyline cutting and welding
 In oxygen tanks for deep sea divers and mountain climbers to provide oxygen
 For respiration for most animals
 Used as oxygen tents in hospital to aid patients with respiratory problems

Carbon Cycle

- Carbon dioxide is produced mainly by respiration. Here, sugars such as glucose are converted into
carbon dioxide and water, giving out energy (exothermic)

Respiration of glucose equation:

C6H12O6 + 6O2 → 6CO2 + 6H2O

- Carbon dioxide is also produced by combustion of fuels, in factories, and in the home

- The carbon dioxide is then absorbed by plants, by photosynthesis. Energy is absorbed (endothermic)
from the sun, and used to build up simple sugars.

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Photosynthesis equation:

6CO2 + 6H2O → C6H12O6 + 6O2

- Animals eat plants, and in turn, they themselves get eaten by other animals. So the carbon originally in
the atmosphere ends up in every living plant and animal. Upon death, the carbon is released by bacteries
and fungi, to return to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide.

The cycle is then repeated.

Greenhouse effect

Solar radiation at the frequencies of visible light largely passes through the atmosphere to warm the
planetary surface, which then emits this energy at the lower frequencies of infrared thermal radiation.
Infrared radiation is absorbed by greenhouse gases, which in turn re-radiate much of the energy to the
surface and lower atmosphere. The mechanism is named after the effect of solar radiation passing
through glass and warming a greenhouse, but the way it retains heat is fundamentally different as a
greenhouse works by reducing airflow, isolating the warm air inside the structure so that heat is not lost
by convection.

"To balance the absorbed incoming [solar] energy, the Earth must, on average, radiate the same
amount of energy back to space. Because the Earth is much colder than the Sun, it radiates at
much longer wavelengths, primarily in the infrared part of the spectrum . Much of this thermal
radiation emitted by the land and ocean is absorbed by the greenhouse gases(Carbondioxide,
methane, water vapours) and reradiated back to Earth. This is called the greenhouse effect."

Greenhouse effect is natural phenomenon by which average temperature of earth’s surface is maintained
at 14 °C. If this effect was not present the average temperature of earth’s surface would fall to about −18
°C.

Greenhouse gasesBy their percentage contribution to the greenhouse effect on Earth the four major
gases are:

water vapor, 36–70%

carbon dioxide, 9–26%

methane, 4–9%

ozone, 3–7%

Global Warming:

Earth’s natural greenhouse effect makes life as we know it possible. However, human activities, primarily
the burning of fossil fuels and clearing of forests, have intensified the natural greenhouse effect, causing
global warming.

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  Rise of earth’s average temperature.
 Melting of glaciers
 Rising of sea levels
 Coastal cities can be drowned.
 Hurricanes
 Climatic changes.

Uses of Oxygen
 As rocket fuel
 In steel making, to burn off impurities
 In oxy-acetyline cutting and welding
 In oxygen tanks for deep sea divers and mountain climbers to provide oxygen
 For respiration for most animals
 Used as oxygen tents in hospital to aid patients with respiratory problems