Enviromental problems

The enviroment is all around us. It consist of the flora, fauna, the water, the air, and the earth. However, humans don’t always care for the enviroment as they should. Civilization has brought people many advantages but its products also pollute and damage the environment in which we live. So our planet has many eecological problems. People want bigger houses, better cars, enough food and a lot of entertainment and the whole nature have to pay for it.
 
We have to solve a very big problem where we will put all of this garbage. Some people say that in future the Moon will be our big garbage dump. I think that this is possible because there will be no more room on Earth.
We produce a lot of litter in our households. We should select our litter. In housing estates there can be found special containers for different kind of garbage (glass, paper, plastic). The idea of this is that these materials can be recycled. Recycling is a process when old materials can be used again. Unfortunately it is very expensive but now we are used to seeing recycled paper in books and textbooks. We should recycle everything, because we won’t have enough materials in the future. At the moment 94% of world’s energy comes from fossil fuels, but in twenty years there will be neither oil nor coal. We have other possibilities such as solar, wind or water energy, but it is too expensive.
 
Air pollution is the biggest problem in large cities and in areas with concentrated industrial production. The greatest problem in the cities is smog. This word was formed from two words – smoke and fog. Traffic plays a large role in the creation of air-pollution. Cars, aircraft, big power plants, factories and all branch of industry release a lot of smoke with harmful substances such as sulphur dioxide, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, fly ash and soot.
 
Global warming is caused by the Greenhouse effect. Man made atmospheric emissions, like carbon dioxide (produced by burning fossil fuels), nitrogen oxides (from car exhausts), freon (from aerosol and refrigerators), methan and water vapour prevent the heat from escaping. Then the Earth’s temperature rises, arctic ice melts and areas near the sea level floods.
 
One of the biggest problems is our ozon hole. Ozone forms a layer in the upper atmosphere which protects life on Earth from ultraviolet rays, which cause skin cancer. This layer is destroyed by freons. The biggest ozone hole has formed over Antarctica and Australia.
 
The air-pollution also causes acid rain, which fall down onto trees and slowly kill them. Trees are vitally important for our life because they are the lungs of our planet. They absorb carbon dioxide from the air and give out oxygen in return. In some parts of the world, such as Asia and South America, trees are not threatened by pollution, but by people. The great rain forests are being destroyed for firewood and buildings materials. If we lose tropical forests, it will become more difficult, perhaps even impossible, to breath.
 
Another problem concerning the city environment is sewage. In some places there are not sewage works and sewage is released into watercourses. Many factories released their waste into the rivers.
Water is also polluted by pesticides and other chemicals used in agriculture. Finally, we have experienced a nubmer of ecological catastrophes, such as oil tanker accidents. One tank of oil can pollute several million litres of water, which causes many fish and seabirds to die.
 
The most known environmental organization is Greenpeace. This international organization fights against pollution, often by organizing various action against nuclear power plants and the use of nuclear energy in industry. Many other ecological organizations take care about our nature, but everyone can do something for our environment.
 
What can we personally do to protect the environment?
- Save water (have a shower rather than a bath)
- Save energy (switch off the light when leaving)
- Sort out waste and put in into containers, compost kitchen garbage
- Use deodorant sprays without CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) gases
- Put litter only into litter bins, not in the street
- Not be noisy in the woods, not pick flowers
- Not use fertilizers in the garden
- Use public transport, bike when possible
- Use unleaded petrol
- Be more considerate to nature around us