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The Town of the XXI Century
Series of reports on ecological situation in Central Asia
THE PLANET AND WE: THE
ECOLOGICAL POINT OF VIEW
The USA law on clean air - the "arcane" for pollution
In the USA the law "On clean air" was adopted for the first time
in 1955 and was revised in 1963, 1965 and 1967. In theses early editions the
role of the Federal government was kept in the shadow. The largest part of
controlling functions and oversight of the law's execution was left to the
states, which largely ignore the law. The current law was adopted in 1970 and
was significantly amended and expanded in 1977. Today the "Law on clean air" is
a quite thick document including more than 100 pages. The Law is accompanied by
a large number of other legislative acts. The foundation of the Law is comprised
of the national air quality standards, which set the acceptable levels for
various polluting substances. The law also sets various quality standards for
the industrial plants, power plants, and other, so called, "stationary
pollutants". Finally, the law has provisions covering the exhaust gases of the
vehicles. This stimulated the officials to use of catalytic transformers and
quality control of the work of the vehicles' engines. Three largest vehicle
manufacturers started to conduct serious work to develop mass production of
electric vehicles, which can effectively compete with the gasoline-powered ones.
Officials in California made a decision to deploy zero-pollution vehicles by
1998. Accordingly, for the gasoline engines a provision was made to supply only
clean gasoline. The Law insisted in large companies stimulating their workers
using one car or public transportation to go to work. Within a short period of
time the carbon monoxide wastes were reduced by 90% and nitrogen oxide - by 75%.
Lead was almost completely excluded from the atmosphere as a result of the ban
on ethyl gasoline use. The US Congress constantly makes amendments to the Law
necessary to solve the problem of toxic air pollution.
It is not recommended to breath deeply
"The Law on protection of the atmospheric air of the Kazakh
Soviet Socialistic Republic" was adopted in 1981. "The Law on the environment of
the Republic of kazakhstan", which was put into effect in 1991, does not provide
for a ban on the use of ethyl gasoline, does not make provisions for the
obligatory installation of catalytic transformers, for the use of gas cleaning
technologies at the power plants and other industrial objects. Several years ago
attempts were made to write a new law on atmospheric air protection, but they
were not successful.
The new era in electric power production
The use of new technologies may lead to reduction of the levels
of wastes from the power plants. To burn coal more rationally at the power
plants, it is transformed into a gas-like condition. The combined cycle of
complex gasification is also used and this results in reduced threats of
environmental pollution. Technologies associated with electric energy production
also include the ones, which allow to decrease the amounts of energy used in the
production cycle with the simultaneous increase in production output. The new
electric light bulbs and the accompanying equipment allow to save significant
amounts of electric energy, this means to spend less efforts on production of
electric energy and, consequently, to reduce environmental pollution.
Speaking about Kazakhstan, it is necessary to stress the fact
that today there are several legislative acts requiring to use at the Almaty
Heating and Energy Plant - 1 only coals with low content of ashes and low-sulphur
gas. A perspective of transformation of the plant for using natural gas was
discussed. But economic difficulties (particularly, constant shortages of gas
supply) forced the officials to change their positive intentions. By the way,
currently the specialists of the Almaty city division of the Ministry of ecology
and natural resources are occupied with somewhat different problems. Head of the
department, Mr. Alexandr Mironuk, says that soon the ecologists will have
"head-aches" associated primarily with economic problems. Particularly, people
start to fight with regular shortages in gas, heat and electricity supplies,
buying various autonomously operating heating and electricity producing devices
(for example, different liquid fuel ovens and mini power plants). In the few
years to come the number of these "sources" of electricity and heat can increase
significantly. And the wastes produced by such devices are much more dangerous
because they climb only to low altitudes. The exhaust tubes of Heating and Power
Plants are high enough for the wastes resulting from burning coal to be
gradually absorbed by the atmosphere and to be moved out of the city limits,
while the wastes produced by the liquid fuel ovens raise to ten meters over the
ground and eventually fall on the ground. This way not only the air, but the
land is also polluted.
People change the skin after a Thursday rain
As a result of burning mineral fuel, the sulphur anhydride (SO2)
and other pollutants appear in te atmosphere an are distributed with rains, fogs
and snow over forests, lakes, rivers and soil. The poisonous fog con be
concentrated enough to cause "carbonization" of leaves and branches of trees.
Oxidized water absorbs poisonous metals from the upper layer of soil and
dissolves them in the tubes polluting the drinking water. The problem is made
more difficult by ozone pollution - photochemical reaction of nitrogen oxides
and organic pollutants results in the appearance of the specific "smog". Ozone
is a form of molecular oxygen, presence of which in the stratosphere (upper
layer of the atmosphere) is important because it blocks dangerous ultra-violet
sun rays. The danger is that the same molecules in the troposphere (lower layer
of the atmosphere) represent dangerous elements destroying living tissues
including human lungs. Destruction of forests is a result of the combined
influence of the acid rains and ozone pollution. Ten thousand lakes in sweden,
Norway, Canada, Great Britain and the United States can not support water types
of life as a result of acid precipitation. Fish was extinguished in thousands of
these lakes. More than 1/5 of all forests in Europe are sick including half of
the forests in West Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands.
The wind lit up lights in my house,the sun provided heat not
only for my soul...
Aerodynamic turbines - one of the most ancient ecologically
clean sources of energy. More than ten years ago thousands of wind devices with
the total projected power of 650 megawatts produced electricity in the USA.
Approximately 80 percent of the world's aerodynamic energy is produced in
California, the kind of energy is getting more common in Mid Western states,
Belgium and Europe.
The most elaborate kind of solar energy is the, so called, "photogalvanic"
system, when the panels are set on the roof or on the ground. Even if one of the
links is broken, the rest of the links continue to function when the sun is
bright and when it is covered by clouds. In Japan and Germany people are
financially stimulated to purchase solar batteries. Active campaigns were
launched in Austria and Switzerland to introduce the new device.
Despite the protests of the "greens", specialists continue to
consider nuclear energy as a environmentally safe. In France about 70 percent of
electric energy is produced by nuclear power plants. However, the new nuclear
power stations are not constructed as a result of the deep fear entrenched in
public consciousness after the catastrophes at Chernobyl and Three-man-island,
USA. But thanks to new technologies, especially to the ones developed in Japan
and Sweden, the attractiveness of nuclear energy may be increased in public
eyes. For example, in Sweden a new " naturally safe reactor" capable of
resisting earthquakes, floods and fires was developed.
Dreams come and do not come true.
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