Unit 5: Environmental Pollution
ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION 5.1. INTRODUCTION The air we breathe, the water we drink and the place we live in may be polluted with unwanted toxic substances. The tremendous increase in industrial activity during the last few decades and the release of toxic industrial wastes into the environment, have been of considerable concern in the recent years from the point of view of environmental pollution. Composition of air It is well known that the outcome of the human activity in the last 200 years on nature (after the industrial revolution) is very damaging and disrupts natural phenomena and ecological balance. Many incidents and issues like the death of thousands of people in Minamata in Japan after eating fish from the local Bay (mercury poisoning), Itai-Itai’ disease (due to cadmium pollution), Bhopal gas tragedy(due to poisonous gas, MIC), London smog in 1952, the emergence of new ocean currents like El-Nino, Global w...